Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: C. ANthony Ryan

  • Pediatric pishogues

    C. Anthony RyanBridget MaherCork, Ireland Although superstitions abound in all societies, Irish tradition has an especially long and rich tradition of folk beliefs and superstitions. Thus, when a newborn infant was recently diagnosed with Klippel-Trenaunay-Weber syndrome,1 a triad of port-wine stain, varicose veins, and hypertrophy, his mother burst out crying saying: “My mother says that…

  • A letter from George Boole and Victorian attitudes towards pregnancy, childbirth and breastfeeding

    C. Anthony RyanDesmond MacHaleYvonne CohenCork, Ireland In 2015, two cities celebrated the 200th anniversary of George Boole’s birth: the City of Lincoln, England where he was born, and Cork City, Ireland, where he died and was buried. Boole was a professor of mathematics at what was then Queen’s College, Cork (now University College Cork), in…