Claude Bernard “what we know may interfere with our learning what we do not know"

PERCIVALL POTT ( ) He another well-known London surgeon, gave classical descriptions of the tuberculous disease of the spine, and of the fracture just above the ankle, still known respectively as Pott's disease and Pott's fracture. Pott was surgeon to St. Bartholomew's Hospital until his death at the age of seventy-four, as there was no retiring age in those days. From his house in Bow Lane he conducted a large surgical practice, attending such distinguished patients as Samuel Johnson and David Garrick. A lively and sociable man, he was popular with all ranks of society.

WILLIAM HEWSON ( ) He was a brilliant young man who demonstrated the existence and function of the lymph vessels in animals, and established the fact that the coagulation of the blood was due, not to a solidification of the corpuscles, but to a substance in the plasma which he called “coagulable lymph," later known as "fibrinogen." Hewson died from septicaemia following a dissection wound at the age of thirty-six.

Robert Knox In 1829 there died in William Hare's lodging-house in the West Port of Edinburgh an old man who had failed to pay his bill. Assisted by Thomas Burke, another of his lodgers who, like himself, was an Irishman, Hare conceived the idea of clearing the debt by the sale of the debtor's body to Dr. Knox for. Encouraged by this success, the two ruffians embarked upon a series of murders, luring their victims into the house, plying them with drink and then suffocating them, so that the body showed no trace of violence.

CLAUDE BERNARD (I8I3-78) His first work related to digestion. By a series of carefully planned experiments, he showed that digestion was not completed in the stomach, as had been believed, but that gastric digestion was only a preparatory act. Digestion was continued in the intestine, through the action of the pancreatic juice or secretion. It was during this series of experiments that one of his dogs, having a cannula fixed in its pancreatic duct, escaped from the laboratory, and was brought back by the irate owner, an inspector of police.

CLAUDE BERNARD The next important discovery, that of glycogen, was also the outcome of systematic and planned experiments. Bernard proved that the liver did not merely secrete bile ; it also produced sugar, and this function was independent of sugar in the diet. There was, in fact, an “internal secretion," or milieu interieur, and in giving it this name Bernard paved the way for the discovery of the numerous " hormones " which we now recognize. Moreover, the production of sugar by the liver showed that the animal body could build up substances as well as destroy them.

CLAUDE BERNARD A third discovery was that of the vasomotor mechanism. Bernard was working at the subject of animal heat when he noted that division of the cervical sympathetic nerve in a rabbit raised the temperature on that side of the head and neck. With characteristic insight he saw the significance of this side issue, and turned aside from his main quest to ascertain how the nerve could influence temperature. While investigating the function of the submandibular gland, he showed that the sympathetic nerve was the constrictor of the blood vessels ; the chorda tympani was the dilator. Thus were the fundamental facts of vasomotor physiology made known.

History of Small pox Smallpox, now a comparatively rare disease, was very prevalent during the eighteenth century. The mortality was high, and among the survivors there were many pock-marked faces and cases of blindness. Any relief from such a plague was welcome. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, wife of the British Ambassador in Turkey, introduced “inoculation“ into England in 1717.

History of Small pox After the method had been tried successfully upon six condemned criminals, several members of the Royal House were inoculated, and this naturally increased the popularity of the procedure.

Inoculation and Vaccination Inoculation (also known as variolation) was a historical method for the prevention of smallpox by deliberate introduction into the skin of material from smallpox pustules. This generally produced a less severe infection than naturally-acquired smallpox, but still induced immunity to it.

Sir Charles Bell and His Work A number of discoveries received his name: Bell's (external respiratory) nerve: The long thoracic nerve. Bell's palsy: a unilateral idiopathic paralysis of facial muscles due to a lesion of the facial nerve. Bell's phenomenon: A normal defense mechanism—upward and outward movement of the eye which occurs when an individual closes their eyes forcibly. It can be appreciated clinically in a patient with paralysis of the orbicularis oculi (e.g.Guillain-Barre or Bell's palsy), as the eyelid remains elevated when the patient tries to close the eye. Bell's spasm: Involuntary twitching of the facial muscles. Bell-Magendie law or Bell's Law: States that the anterior branch of spinal nerve roots contain only motor fibers and the posterior roots contain only sensory fibers.

Physiology and Physics JOHANNES MULLER HERMANN VON HELMHOLTZ ( ) RUDOLF VIRGHOW ( ). MARSHALL HALL ( )

JOHANNES MULLER His main discovery in embryology is of (Miillerian ducts); he investigated the production of sound by the vocal cords; and he was one of the first to classify tumours according to their microscopic appearances

HERMANN VON HELMHOLTZ ( ) He established, by electrical means, the rate of transmission of nerve impulses. Next, at the very outset of the investigations which led to the publication of his great work on Physiological Optics ( ), he invented the ophthalmoscope, and " had the great joy of being the first to see a living human retina."

MARSHALL HALL ( ) At his house in Manchester Square he kept a regular menagerie of animals for his experiments. Like John Hunter, he studied hibernation, but his greatest achievement was his discovery of reflex action, which originated from the observation that a headless newt moved when the skin was pricked. Marshall Hall showed how “ reflex action“ explained the act of coughing, the involuntary closure of the eyes when threatened, the first breath of a new-born child, and many other acts.

RUDOLF VIRGHOW The Cell Theory Complete The 3 Basic Components of the Cell Theory were now complete: 1. All organisms are composed of one or more cells. (Schleiden & Schwann)( ) 2. The cell is the basic unit of life in all living things. (Schleiden & Schwann)( ) 3. All cells are produced by the division of preexisting cells. (Virchow)(1858)