Month: November 2019
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Human heart in Descartes’s De Homine
The famous philosopher René Descartes had an interest in physiology. But although he is known to have carried out dissections and even vivisections, he was a theoretician and not an experimentalist. In 1643 he wrote that having read William Harvey’s 1628 De Moto Cordis he agreed with the theory that the blood circulated through the…
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Preparation for surgery
A nurse and a surgeon, both wearing gown and mask. Etching by H.A. Freeth. Copyright M, A and R Freeth. CC BY This simple drawing of a nurse and surgeon preparing for work captures the tension in the moment just before surgery begins. Though only a small portion of either figure’s face is visible,…
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Oliver Sacks and caring for the whole person
Margaret Marcum Boca Raton, Florida Body shapes, female. Martin Addison. Wellcome Collection. CC BY 4.0. The neurologist Oliver Sacks—“The Poet Laureate of Medicine” according to The New York Times—developed an effective clinical method of treating the patient as a complete person rather than as a defective body part. He wrote that clinicians “are concerned…
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Moral lessons through pictures
These images, taken from a series called Moral Lessons Through Pictures of Good and Evil, are meant to communicate morality in traditional Japanese society. Each lesson is made up of a pair of opposing images, one representing the ideal and the other the less than ideal. In one image shown here, a doctor is seen…
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Unnamed surgeon
In this painting an unknown Netherlandish artist features some of the attributes of a surgeon’s profession: a skull, a tool for cauterizing skulls, a saw, and several keys on the surgeon’s belt. The unnamed surgeon seems composed, serious, with a firm jaw and wrinkled eyes. This is fitting of his position and reputation among the…
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Konrad Langenbeck 1776-1851
Son of a pastor, Konrad Johann Martin Langenbeck attended medical school in Jena, Germany, from 1794 to 1798, then practiced surgery in his home town of Horneburg. There he was so successful in carrying out eye operations that he received a stipend from the then court of Hanover for further studies in Vienna and Wurzburg.…
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The central nervous system of the leech
Leeches are worms of the subspecies Hirudinea that live in oceans, rivers, or on land. They consist of several parts or segments; a front area designated as the head or anterior brain, the middle part consisting of segments each containing a nerve ganglion as well as other organs, and the hind part which has the…
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Catalepsy
Catalepsy has been defined as a trance or seizure with a loss of sensation and consciousness accompanied by rigidity of the body. It may occur in neurological diseases such as Parkinsonism and epilepsy, also following the withdrawal from certain drugs such as cocaine. These images are part of a series of observations made in an…
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Atlas of head sections
Sir William Macewen, pioneer of modern brain surgery, was born in western Scotland in 1848. In 1872 he graduated in medicine from the University of Glasgow, greatly influenced by Lord Lister. In 1875 he was appointed to the Glasgow Royal Infirmary, first as assistant surgeon, and in 1877 as full surgeon. Continuing his career as…