Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: Thomas Sydenham

  • Christopher Wren’s contributions to medicine

    JMS Pearce Hull, England   Fig 1. Left: Sir Christopher Wren. From James Bissett’s Magnificent Guide, 1808. Wellcome Collection via Wikimedia. Public domain. Right: Blue plaque at Hampton Court Green. Photo by Edwardx on Wikimedia. CC BY-SA 4.0. An extraordinary natural philosopher and Renaissance man, Christopher Wren (1632–1723) (Fig 1) was primarily an astronomer and…

  • Hypochondria

    JMS PearceHull, England, United Kingdom In words, as fashions, the same rule will hold;Alike fantastic, if too new, or old:Be not the first by whom the new are tried,Nor yet the last to lay the old aside.— Alexander Pope The changing use and meaning of words are the daily bread of dictionary compilers. Long ago…

  • Gouty quotes

    JMS Pearce Hull, England The recent reproduction of G. Cruikshank’s A self-indulgent man afflicted with gout by a demon burning his foot reminded me of many memorable remarks made by sages of various disciplines (several themselves victims of gout) on the subject. That the excruciating pain of gout (Figs 1 and 2) provokes mirth and ribald…

  • The three contraries of Benjamin Franklin: “the gout, the stone and not yet master of all my passions”

    James L. Franklin Chicago, Illinois, United States   Fig 1: Portrait of Benjamin Franklin. From a carbonic alloy engraving, drawn by C. N. Cochin 1777, engraved by A.H. Richie. Public Domain. Via Wikimedia  On May 23, 1785, Benjamin Franklin wrote from Passy on the outskirts of Paris to George Whatley that “at Fourscore the three…

  • Thomas Sydenham, “The English Hippocrates”

    JMS Pearce East Yorks, UK   Fig 1. Thomas Sydenham. Abraham Blooteling after Mary Beale – portrait of Thomas Sydenham 8-B-47-Med Source Still Fever burns, and all her skill defies Till Sydenham’s wisdom plays a double part, Quells the disease and helps the failing Art. -from a poem on plague by John Locke, 1668  …

  • Rheumatic fever: Evolution of causal concepts and management

    Amogh BJTrivandrum, Kerala, India Nanditha VenkatesanRaipur, Chhattisgarh, India For centuries rheumatic fever (RF) and its sequelae scourged the lives of millions of people. Despite a substantial decline in deaths from the disease, rheumatic heart disease remains a problem, especially in areas of poverty. Over the past few centuries, a growing understanding of its causation and…

  • The “English Hippocrates” and the disease of kings

    Anne Jacobson Oak Park, Illinois, United States   Portrait of Thomas Sydenham, Mary Beale, 1688 Thomas Sydenham (1624-1689) is known as “The English Hippocrates” because of his detailed physical examinations, painstaking record keeping, and attention to the treatment of illness.1  At a time when the medical profession espoused theory and systemization, his belief in the…

  • Death by Dysentery? Artist Frank Russell Wadsworth in Madrid

    Sally Metzler Chicago, Illinois, United States   Frank Russell Wadsworth (1874-1905) A River Lavadero, 1905, Oil on canvas, Union League Club Chicago Though he basked in the Spanish sun, the summer warmth would be his downfall, indeed his early death. Artist Frank Russell Wadsworth of Chicago gravitated towards the vivid colors and picturesque river banks…

  • Incurably curious: mystery and drama in clinical case reports

    Julia Dahlkamp London, United Kingdom     Thomas Sydenham, 1688 Mary Beale National Portrait Gallery, London Introduction In recent years the genre of the written medical case report1 has come to be regarded as unscientific, a form of anecdotal evidence low in the hierarchy of study designs.2 Clinical geneticists, on the other hand, have emphasized…