The University of Iowa History of Medicine Society invites you to hear Patrick T. O’Shaughnessy, PhD, Associate Professor, Department of Occupational and Environmental Health, University of Iowa, speak on “Malaria and DDT: the History of a Controversial Association” on Tuesday, January 19th, 5:30 to 6:30, room 2032 Main Library. Dr. O’Shaughnessy observes: “Although it helped prevent millionsContinue reading “Presentation on the History of Malaria and DDT”
Author Archives: Donna Hirst
Notes From the Rare Book Room –A Private Pestilence
Puerperal fever, often called childbed fever, ravaged obstetrics patients in the U.S., Britain, and Europe throughout the 18th and 19th centuries. Its symptoms included severe abdominal pain, fever, and debility and carried a mortality rate as high as seventy percent during some epidemics. Even though the greatest incidences occurred in close-quartered “lying-in hospitals,” (state-supported maternityContinue reading “Notes From the Rare Book Room –A Private Pestilence”
Notes from the Rare Book Room “Anatome animalium”
Gerardus Blasius (1626?-1692?). Anatome animalium. Amsterdam, 1681. Although Blasius was a practicing physician in Amsterdam, his real interest lay in anatomy and, in particular, comparative anatomy. He worked closely with philosophers and scientists such as John Locke, Jan Swammerdam, and Niels Stensen to promote the study of anatomy and to widen the availability of bothContinue reading “Notes from the Rare Book Room “Anatome animalium””
Notes from the Rare Book Room “Histoire de medicine”
Daniel Le Clerc (1652-1728). Histoire de la médecine. Nouvelle ed. Amsterdam: Aux depens de la Compagnie, 1723. Swiss physician, Daniel Le Clerc was born at Geneva and studied medicine at Montpellier and Paris. He received the M.D. degree at Valencia in 1670 and returned to Geneva to enter private practice. Although successful as a physician,Continue reading “Notes from the Rare Book Room “Histoire de medicine””
Notes from the Rare Book Room “Wrap up the Sword and Call me in the Morning”
But she has taen the broken lance, And washed it from the clotted gore, And salved the splinter o’er and o’er. —Sir Walter Scott: Lay of the Last Minstrel—1805 The notion that wounds can be healed from a distance dates back hundreds, perhaps thousands of years and is retained in some folk remedies today. However,Continue reading “Notes from the Rare Book Room “Wrap up the Sword and Call me in the Morning””
Notes from the Rare Book Room: The Great Herbal of Leonhart Fuchs
In the sixteenth century the same spirit which inspired Vesalius and others in the field of anatomy served also as the inspiration for the study of flora from actual specimens, culminating in what is certainly the most celebrated and probably the most beautiful herbal ever published, Fuchs’ De historia stirpium commentarii Basel, 1542. Leonhart FuchsContinue reading “Notes from the Rare Book Room: The Great Herbal of Leonhart Fuchs”
Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room: Making the Best of a Bad Situation
William Beaumont (1785-1853). Experiments and Observations on the Gastric Juice and the Physiology of Digestion, Plattsburgh, 1833. When U.S. Army Surgeon William Beaumont saw the gaping hole in Alex St. Martin’s side, he had every reason to believe the wound was fatal. The 28 year old Canadian voyager was accidentally shot in the stomach byContinue reading “Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room: Making the Best of a Bad Situation”
Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room — Long Before Google
GREGOR REISCH (ca. 1467-1525). Margarita philosophica. 2nd ed., 1504]. Long before there was Google and Britannica, there was Margarita philosophica, which might be called the first modern encyclopedia. Its twelve divisions cover the trivium (grammar, logic and rhetoric), the quadrivium (arithmetic, geometry, music and astronomy), and the natural and moral sciences. Of particular fascination are theContinue reading “Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room — Long Before Google”
News from the John Martin Rare Book Room – Activities of Daily Living
Activities of Daily Living– While fads and fancies in health and medicine come and go, the underlying essentials of wellbeing, including, rest, nutrition, exercise, and moderation have gone unchallenged for millennia. One of the more popular works outlining keys to basic fitness is the Tacuini sanitatis by the eleventh century Iraq physician, Ibn Butlān (d.Continue reading “News from the John Martin Rare Book Room – Activities of Daily Living”
Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room
L’orthopédie The simple image of a crooked tree splinted to a wooden pole is one of the most recognizable symbols in medicine. Its first appearance was as an engraving in Andry de Bois-Regard’s 1741publication, L’orthopédie; ou, “L’art de prévenir et de corriger dan les enfans, les difformités du corps* *Orthopaedia: or the Art of CorrectingContinue reading “Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room”