Adequate nutrition is essential for the normal structure and function of bone tissues and for repair after injury. The anatomic relations of joints and their articular cartilage, the growth of bone in the metaphyses and the repair of fractures and dislocations are specific problems of the skeletal system in which nutrition is a determining factor. Studies of diseases and injuries of bone and their repair demand a knowledge of the intrinsic vascular pattern and of the opportunity for collateral circulation of most bones and, in particular, of certain bones and epiphyses.
Many reports, some speculative and conflicting, have included a discussion of the etiology and repair of various forms of osteochondritis, aseptic and septic necrosis, epiphyseal slipping or separation and other more or less obscure changes in the epiphyses and in their cartilage. There is, further, some doubt regarding the normal circulation of bone and the importance of the various