Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: Ferdinand Sauerbruch

  • A drawing created during World War I

    Tilman SauerbruchBonn, Germany A photograph of a drawing by Max Beckmann (1884-1950) of the surgeon Ferdinand Sauerbruch (1875-1951) has been hanging in my room since my student days (Fig. 1). At the top right there is a note: “To Prof. Sauerbruch in memory of the May 1915 M. Beckmann.” Beckmann was thirty-one years old at…

  • Ferdinand Sauerbruch, father of thoracic surgery

    Annabelle SlingerlandLeon LacquetLeiden, the Netherlands Ferdinand Sauerbruch (1875-1951) was one of the most important thoracic surgeons of the first half of the twentieth century, remembered for pioneering a method that would allow access to the thoracic cavity and the heart. Three years after his death in 1954, his life was detailed in a movie authored…