1751 STUBBS, George (1724 – 1806); BURTON, John (1697 – 1771)

An essay towards a complete new system of midwifery, theoretical and practical.

Burton was the first to suggest that puerperal fever is contagious, and the first to give a detailed discussion of Caesarean section. Laurence Steme satirized him as “Dr. Slop” in The life and opinions of Tristram Sha…

GMN 6268 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/7976

1772 LEAKE, John (1729 – 1792)

Practical observations on the child-bed fever.

Leake insisted on the contagious nature of puerperal fever. Reprinted, London, Sydenham Society, 1949.

GMN 6269 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/7978

1773 WHITE, Charles (1728 – 1813)

A treatise on the management of pregnant and lying-in women, and the means of curing, but more especially of preventing the principal disorders to which they are liable. Together with some new directions concerning the delivery of the child and placenta in natural births. illustrated with cases.

White was the first to state clearly in a text on midwifery the necessity of absolute cleanliness in the lying-in chamber, the isolation of infected patients, and adequate ventilation. He instituted the principle of u…

GMN 6270 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/7980

1784 WHITE, Charles (1728 – 1813)

An inquiry into the nature and cause of that swelling, in one or both of the lower extremeties, which sometimes happens to lying-in-women.

First clinical description of phlegmasia alba dolens. White ascribed it to destruction of the lymphatics due to pressure of the foetal head.

GMN 6271 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/7982

1795 GORDON, Alexander (1752 – 1799)

A treatise on the epidemic puerperal fever of Aberdeen.

Gordon was the first to advance as a definite hypothesis the contagious nature of puerperal fever, thus preceding Holmes and Semmelweis by half a century. He also advocated the disinfection of the clothes of the docto…

GMN 6272 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/7984

1823 DAVIS, David Daniel (1777 – 1841)

An essay on the proximate cause of the disease called phlegmasia dolens.

Davis was the first to state that phlegmasia alba dolens was due to inflammation of the veins. He was physician-accoucheur at the birth of Queen Victoria.

GMN 6273 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/7986

1842 –1843 HOLMES, Oliver Wendell Sr. (1809 – 1894)

The contagiousness of puerperal fever.

Oliver Wendell Holmes was the first to establish the contagious nature of puerperal fever. His essay on the subject took a strong line against the opinions then prevailing, stirring up violent opposition among the obs…

GMN 6274 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/7989

1847 –1848 SEMMELWEIS, Ignaz Philipp (Ignác Fülöp) (1818 – 1865)

Höchst wichtige Erfahrungen über die Aetiologie der in Gebäranstalten epidemischen Puerperalfieber.

Semmelweis, pioneer of antisepsis in obstetrics, was the first to recognize that puerperal fever is a septicemia. He concluded that the doctors and students of Vienna’s First Obstetrical Clinic carried the infection o…

GMN 6275 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/7990

1855 HOLMES, Oliver Wendell Sr. (1809 – 1894)

Puerperal fever, as a private pestilence.

Because his first paper (No. 6274) had been published in a short-lived journal with very small circulation, Holmes enlarged his famous essay on the contagiousness of puerperal fever, and in this reiteration mentioned …

GMN 6276 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/7992

1861 SEMMELWEIS, Ignaz Philipp (Ignác Fülöp) (1818 – 1865)

Die Aetiologie, der Begriff und die Prophylaxis des Kindbettfiebers.

Semmelweis, who earlier had shown puerperal fever to be a septicemia, strove to improve conditions in the lying-in wards of Vienna and Budapest. Misunderstood and maligned by many, he eventually published this book in…

GMN 6277 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/7996

1861 –1862 SEMMELWEIS, Ignaz Philipp (Ignác Fülöp) (1818 – 1865)

(1) Zwei offene Briefe an Hofrath Dr. Eduard Casp. Jac. v. Siebold, . . . und an Hofrath Dr. F. W. Scanzoni . . .Ofen... 1861. (2) Zwei offene Briefe an Dr. J. Spaeth, Professor der Geburtshilfe an der k. k. Josefs-Akademie in Wien, und an Hofrath Dr. F. W. Scanzoni, Professor der Geburtshilfe zu Würzburg. Pest...1861. (3) Offener Brief an sämmtliche Professoren der Geburtshilfe. Ofen...1862.

Semmelweis’s last publications on antisepsis in obstetrics. Although the information and conclusions that Semelweis drew in his Die Aetiologie, der Begriff und die Prophylaxis des Kindbettfiebers (1861) were of the fi…

GMN 13270 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/15536

1879 PASTEUR, Louis (1822 – 1895)

Septicémie puerpérale.

Description of the streptococcus of puerperal sepsis.

GMN 6278 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/7997

1892 DÖDERLEIN, Albert Siegmund Gustav (1860 – 1941)

Das Scheidensekret und seine Bedeutung für das Puerperalfieber.

Döderlein's study of the vaginal secretion in relation to puerperal fever includes the first description of “Döderlein’s bacillus” (Lactobacillus). Döderlein introduced the concept of normal body bacteria or "normal b…

GMN 6279 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/7999

1905 SEMMELWEIS, Ignaz Philipp (Ignác Fülöp) (1818 – 1865); GYÖRY, Tibor (1869 – 1938)

Semmelweis’ gesammelte Werke. Heraugegeben aus zum Theil aus dem Ungarischen Übersetzt von Tiberius von Gyory.

An annotated edition and translation, including the texts of Semmelweis’s works on puerperal fever as a septicemia (No. 6275) and on the etiology of puerperal sepsis (No. 6277) as well as other gynecological papers an…

GMN 82.1 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/1381

1919 HALBAN, Josef von (1870 – 1937); KÖHLER, Robert (1884 – 1955)

Die pathologische Anatomie des Puerperalprozesses.

GMN 6280 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/8001

1923 JONES, William Henry Samuel (1876 – 1963); HIPPOCRATES, [Ἱπποκράτης; Hippocrates of Kos] (-460 – -370)

Epidemics 1, case 4. In: [Works] with an English translation by W.H. Jones.

The earliest known description of puerperal fever.

GMN 6267 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/7975

1935 ANSELM, Eugen

Unsere Erfahrungen mit Prontosil bei Puerperalfieber.

First report of the use of an antimicrobial agent in the treatment of obstetric infections.

GMN 6280.1 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/8003

1936 COLEBROOK, Leonard (1883 – 1967); KENNY, Méave

Treatment of human puerperal infections, and of experimental infections in mice, with prontosil.

Chemotherapeutic treatment of puerperal sepsis.

GMN 6281 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/8005

1946 SEMMELWEIS, Ignaz Philipp (Ignác Fülöp) (1818 – 1865); MURPHY, Frank P.

Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis (1818-1865), an annotated bibliography

GMN 12822 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/15068

1953 HOLMES, Oliver Wendell Sr. (1809 – 1894); CURRIER, Thomas Franklin (1873 – 1946); TILTON, Eleanor Marguerite (1913 – 1991)

A bibliography of Oliver Wendell Holmes

GMN 11203 · https://historyofmedicine.com/id/13400