Dansk medicinhistorisk arbog最新文献

In Denmark it was decided early in the 20th century that therapy with radium should be restricted to major centres in the three largest cities, Copenhagen, Aarhus and Odense. In the northern part of Jutland the chief surgeon of Nykøbing Mors Hospital, Jacob Nordentoft (1881-1954), had studied radium treatment in Hamburg with Albers-Schönberg and in Paris with Marie Curie, and he had used radium in his private clinic since 1910. Naturally he wanted to continue this when he became chief in Nykøbing in 1922. As he was denied this the 22,000 inhabitants of this small island in 1931 collected 28,790 Danish Crowns for him as a birthday present and afterwards he could buy 94 mg pure radium from Belgium. With this amount he established a Radium Centre which lasted for 30 years.

The first set of legislation for doctors in Denmark was conditional on a national need to regulate the conditions of the pharmaceutical and medical professions. By request of the king, this legislation, which came into force in 1672, was made by doctors residing in Denmark. These doctors had all been educated at foreign universities where the existing legislation had Roger II's and Friedrich II's legislation from the 12th and 13th centuries' South Italy as its source of inspiration. Thus, it is reasonable to presume that the doctors who participated in the making of the Danish legislation were familiar with this legislation. A translation into Danish of Roger II's and Friedrich II's sections regarding the work of a doctor has been made in order to be able to compare it with the content of the Danish set of legislation from 1672. The result of this comparison is that there are so many similarities that there can hardly be any doubt about the fact that the medieval legislation has been used as source for the Danish legislation from 1672.

Nuclear medicine is among the youngest medical specialties but its history spans more than a century. From the earliest discoveries of radioactivity and the establishment of the novel field of nuclear physics at the turn of the twentieth century and via the developments in radiochemistry set in motion by George de Hevesy from his base in Copenhagen to the specialty of today offering a multitude of diagnostic procedures. The present work is not intended to cover the entire history of nuclear medicine exhaustively but focus on pivotal events in the development of the field with special reference to Denmark.

For six centuries the barbers of Europe practiced surgery. In 1215 a papal edict forbade members of the clergy (physicians) from performing surgical procedures as contact with blood was felt to be contaminating to men of the church. Bloodletting and minor surgery was now turned over to the barber-surgeons and this was in agreement with the medical doctors who felt that these procedures were beneath their dignity. The barber-surgeons were sometimes called "doctors of the short robe" to distinguish them from the medical doctors and surgeons who were called "doctors of the long robe", although university status was hardly given to the surgeons. Ambroise Paré started as a barber-surgeon and his eminence was honoured by the long robe. It was his experience at the Hôtel Dieu that permitted him to serve as a surgeon to the French army and through his open mind Paré made many innovations during his career. Paré abolished the painful practise of cautery to stop bleeding and used ligatures and dressings instead. A multitude of subjects were included in his writings such as military surgery, aneurysm, hernia, obstetrics and plague, and through his techniques he guided the development of the gentle art of surgery. Paré became the founder of modern surgery, a restorative process that heals the body with minimal suffering.

In present time depression affects 3-5% of the population in the western countries. Has this illness always existed? Can it be traced backwards in historical periods? The answer is a reluctant yes. The term "depression" has been in use in psychiatry for only 150 years and the very term "psychiatry" for 200 years. Before 1800, in classical times, only few elements of modern depression were part of the concept of "melancholia". Classical melancholia was a madness of the few, presenting with "psychotic" symptoms according to present terminology. The depression of modern man is a much broader concept including elements of well-being and capacity to work. Thus, although psychotic symptoms seem to connect the terms melancholia and depression, scientific, social and cultural developments separate the two. This is yet a testimony to the fact that concepts of illness and diseases changes rapidly and distinctively over historical periods.

As in most countries the medical faculty of the University of Lund, Sweden, formerly consisted of a rather small number of professors, twelve at the beginning of the last century. One of these, the ophthalmologist M.K. Löwegren (1836-1923), translated the entire Hippocratic corpus from Greek into Swedish, another, the pathologist M.V. Odenius (1828-1913) all eight books by Celsus on Medicine (De medicina) from Latin. The translation of the corpus hippocraticum appeared in two volumes of a total of 1300 pages in 1909-10, that of de medicina in one volume of 600 pages in 1906. One might wonder if there were special circumstances at that time and place that could explain the extraordinary effort of two aging, retired professors in simultaneously providing outstanding translations of two major medical works from the Antiquity. Though there are indications of a general historical interest in the medical circles in Lund one hundred years ago, neither personal relationship nor cooperation between these two learned gentlemen is on record apart from their membership of the same faculty.

The plague of Athens in 430-426 BC has puzzled scholars and doctors for generations as to the aetiology of this deadly disease that had profound influence on the outcome of the Great Peloponnesian War (431-404 BC). Like several thousand soldiers and civilians, Pericles succumbed to the plague in 429. The main opponent to Athens was Sparta. Sparta had a formidable land based army, whereas Athens dominated at sea. Pericles' strategy was to shelter the whole of Attica's population within the protecting walls of Athens and Piraeus and the long walls connecting the two cities, while the Spartans ravaged Attica during the summer months. The result was a tremendous overcrowding in the two cities. The number of inhabitants rose from 145,000 to more than half a million. Therefore optimal conditions for the outbreak of an epidemic of any contagious disease were present. The Athenian general and historian Thucydides (455-396 BC), though not a medical man himself, has provided us with a very clear and precise description of the disease, which he himself contracted but survived. A huge number of modern aetiologies has been proposed, but none has so far been able to match Thucydides' clinical picture in all details. Presumably the disease has changed so much during the past 2400 years as not to be recognisable any more or it has totally disappeared.

Since the 1850ies the city of Copenhagen changed, ramparts were removed or remodelled as parks, industries were established. The new factories and wharfs expanded, labourers were needed; many country people moved into the city to find work and thus the population increased immensely. In Copenhagen a few hospitals only were present around 1850; The Royal Frederik Hospital (now the Museum of applied Arts) was the only hospital in the modern sense of the word. Other institutions with "hospital" as part of their name as e.g. General Hospital (Almindelig Hospital) or Ladegaarden were a mixture of hospital and workhouse and The Royal Maternity Hospital founded in 1750. The wealthy and the upper middle class citizens were nursed or cured at home. At the end of the nineteenth century medical doctors could successfully cure some diseases, and surgeons could after the introduction of the anesthetic and aseptic treatment carry out operations with diminished risks of complications. Copenhagen's first modern hospital, Municipal Hospital (Kommunehospitalet) opened 1863, but in a very short time it was permanently overcrowded. Although two small hospitals Blegdam Hospital (isolation hospital) and the Oresund Hospital (quarantine station) were established a large new hospital was needed. Although the financial situation of the city of Copenhagen was strained due to the expenditures caused by the rapidly growing population within the city itself and the villages incorporated into it, the first social democratic mayor Jens Jensen wanted to secure his voters the same care and treatment as citizens of better means. As this view was accepted by the majority of the city council a hospital in the then modern and functional pavilion system (ascribed to Florence Nightingale) with buildings surrounded by gardens was planned. The architect Martin Nyrop (1849-1921) who had just completed the monumental and beautiful Copenhagen City Hall along with the engineer AC Karsten (1857-1931) and landscape architect Edvard Glaesel (1858-1915) were entrusted with the task to develop the design of the hospital. Bispebjerg Hospital was built in the years 1907-13 on a piece of land of 21 hectares on a slope facing southeast at Bispebjerg Bakke at the lower end bordering on Lersøen, a lake which eventually was filled and drained. The 6 red 2-story brick pavilions are located around an axis along Bispebjerg hill with southeast facing bedrooms over viewing the lush patient gardens. These sick rooms all had large double windows at the southeast providing excellent daylight. On the walls are washable frescoes with motifs from nature. Pavilion buildings are flanked by two avenues with linden trees on both sides and connected by crossroads between the buildings. Underground tunnels link the buildings. On both sides, the two lower pavilions on the same side of the central avenue staircase are linked together by a long covered bridge leading from the first floor of the first building to the

In the article three kinds of history writing about the mind-body relationship are presented: History as a puzzle, history as a connection of important pieces into meaningful narrative traditions and history as an investigation into the changing importance and meaning of concepts and discussions in medical history. In particular, ideas behind "Begriffsgeschichte" are presented in detail. The history of imagination is given as an example of the usefulness of tracing concepts and discussions back in time and looking for modern representations. Discussions on the power of imagination initiated the first clinical trials in the 18th century. Emphasis on the power of the mind, self-efficacy and self-care has today substituted earlier discussions on the power of imagination.