Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis

SEMMELWEIS, Ignaz Philipp (1818–65), a world-famous obstetrician. As a student of Skoda and Rokitansky, he initially worked in surgery; in 1846, he received his degree as a doctor of obstetrics and worked in obstetrics in Vienna at Klein's clinic. Medicine owes to Semmelweis the discovery of the cause of puerperal fever. However, his brilliant discovery was not only unrecognized by the prominent scientists of his era but was subjected to ridicule. Scientists such as Simpson, Dubois, and Scanzoni did not share Semmelweis's discovery, and Virchow did not even answer his letters. The rampant epidemics of puerperal septic diseases (16–31% mortality) attracted the attention of the young doctor, and by analyzing the mortality rate at Klein's clinic (where students worked) and at the Barth maternity hospital, where midwives were trained, Semmelweis came to the conclusion that the mortality rate in the latter was significantly lower. This was fully confirmed after students were admitted to the Barth hospital, at which point the mortality rate rose sharply. Incidentally, Semmelweis noticed that women who were admitted to the clinic after street births almost never fell ill. The observations he made led him to the conclusion that students must wash their hands before every delivery. These observations provoked a sharply negative attitude from his chief, Klein, and Semmelweis was effectively expelled by him from the clinic. After such a blow, Semmelweis left for Venice; there he learned of the tragic death of his friend Kolletschka following an injury during an autopsy. Studying the history of the disease led him to the thought that the cause of the professor's death and the cause of puerperal sepsis were one and the same; it is transmitted to women in labor by the hands of students who performed deliveries immediately after autopsies. Based on this, Semmelweis came to the final conclusion that, in addition to washing hands, they must be prophylactically disinfected. He returned to Vienna, implemented his ideas at the Barth hospital, and the mortality rate dropped to 0.23%. Semmelweis's conclusions caused a storm of indignation from the scientists of Vienna; the issue was discussed in the Medical Society and took on such an acute form that the minister ordered Semmelweis to leave Vienna as soon as possible. (Semmelweis's discovery began to be recognized only 30 years later, from 1876). Semmelweis left for Budapest, soon went insane, and died in a psychiatric hospital on August 13, 1865. Semmelweis wrote little. His main work is the classic book: Die Aetiologie, der Begriff u. die Prophylaxis des Kindbettfiebers (Budapest-Wien-Lpz., 1861). Literature: Gimmelfarb G., Essay on Pre-Antiseptic Surgery in the First Half of the 19th Century, Ter. obozr., 1912, No. 5; Destouebes L., La vie et l'oeuvre de Philippe Ignaz Semmelweis, P., 1924; Hegar A., Semmelweis, sein Leben u. seine Lehre, Freiburg-Tübingen, 1882.