November, 2022 - Hektoen International

The Royal Society of Medicine of London: A brief history

November 23, 2022

Arpan K. Banerjee Solihull, England RSM, 1 Wimpole Street, London. Photo by Philafrenzy, 2017, on Wikimedia. CC BY-SA 4.0. The origins of the Royal Society of Medicine in London can be traced back to 1805. It was in that year that a breakaway group of learned physicians and surgeons formed a new medical society, […]

It’s not the patient who hit you…

November 23, 2022

JP Sutherland North America The Entombment. Oil painting by Federico Barocci, early 18th century. Victoria and Albert Museum. Although Christopher’s appearance was extraordinary, there was no sign (not even in retrospect) that he would kick me in the groin within the next hour. He was naked, and standing motionless with his arms held out […]

James Joyce’s Ulysses and the human experience

November 23, 2022

Mateja Lekic Phoenix, Arizona, United States Cover of Ulysses, first edition. Via Wikimedia. Public domain. Ulysses is a novel that explores universal themes of the human experience. A modern retelling of the Odyssey, it follows Leopold Bloom during his encounters on the streets of Dublin in a single day. Each episode loosely follows in […]

Huntington’s chorea

November 23, 2022

JMS Pearce Hull, England Fig 1. George Huntington’s 1872 paper “On Chorea.” In the history of medicine, few writers can have received a finer accolade than that bestowed by William Osler on George Huntington. Osler commented: “In the whole range of descriptive nosology there is not to my knowledge, an instance in which a […]

Making radiation visible: Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Godzilla

November 23, 2022

Howard Fischer Uppsala, Sweden Gojira (Godzilla) poster. © Toho Company, 1954. Via Wikimedia. Fair use. “The theme of the film, from the beginning, was the terror of the bomb.”1 – Tomoyuki Tanaka, producer of Gojira (Godzilla) The Third Reich surrendered to the Allies in early May 1945. This did not yet end World […]

The ordeal of Evelyn Waugh

November 21, 2022

Stephen McWilliams Dublin, Ireland Evelyn Waugh. Courtesy of National Portrait Gallery. In Evelyn Waugh’s second-last novel, The Ordeal of Gilbert Pinfold (1957), the eponymous character experiences some singular and troubling symptoms. Mr. Pinfold is a successful writer, not unlike Waugh himself, who embarks on a sea voyage in an effort to cure the chronic […]

Book review: The Big Necessity: Adventures in the World of Human Waste

November 17, 2022

Howard Fischer Uppsala, Sweden Common problem: a water well (foreground) is in close proximity to a pit latrine (brick building at the back), leading to groundwater pollution. Crop of photo by Kennedy Mayumbelo, 2006. SuSanA Secretariat on Flickr, via English Wikipedia. CC BY 2.0. Its title might seem frivolous, but this book is serious, […]

A doctor of the old school

November 15, 2022

“The apparition of a god would not have caused more commotion… “He belonged to that great school of surgery begotten of Bichat, to that generation, now extinct, of philosophical practitioners, who, loving their art with a fanatical love, exercised it with enthusiasm and wisdom. Everyone in his hospital trembled when he was angry; and his […]

And for unto us… Medicine, Messiah, and Christmas

November 10, 2022

Desmond O’Neill Dublin, Ireland Program cover for Handel and Haydn Society concert of December 25, 1815. Courtesy of the Handel and Haydn Society Archives. Although the very first performance of the Messiah took place in April 1742 in Dublin with the London première following in March 1743, the oratorio is closely associated with the […]

Help from the horseshoe crab

November 8, 2022

Howard Fischer Uppsala, Sweden Horseshoe crab. Crop of photo by Didier Descouens, 2009, via Wikimedia. CC BY-SA 4.0. The horseshoe crab (Limulus polyphemus) has not changed in more than 450 million years. It has been called “a living fossil.”1 It is, in fact, not a crab at all, but an arthropod, more closely related […]