William Heberden Research Articles

William Heberden's cases of anaphylactoid purpura.

William Heberden's cases of anaphylactoid purpura.

The influence of androgens, estrogens and related steroids on serum lipids and lipoproteins: Observations in hypogonadal and normal human subjects

T HERE are many diseases to which men are more vulnerable than women [ 71. The most important of these is coronary atherosclerosis. The frequency with which the chief clinical manifestations of this disorder are found in men exceeds that in women severalfold [2,3]. This sex differential was recognized almost two centuries ago when William Heberden, in his treatise on “Pectoris Dolor,” the classic description of the disease to which he gave the name “angina pectoris,” wrote: “I have seen nearly a hundred people under this disorder, of which number there have been three women, and one boy 12 years old. All the rest were men, near, or past the fiftieth year of age.” $ Anatomic studies such as those described by Sjovall and Wihman [4], Ackerman, Dry and Edwards [fl and Schlesinger and Zoll [S] indicate an earlier and more extensive degree of coronary atherosclerosis in the male, although the sex difference is less impressive than is the case with respect to the clinical manifestations. The concept of sex as a vulnerability factor in coronary atherosclerosis is lent further support

Some Chapters in Cambridge Medical History.—III. William Heberden and the Age of Reason

Some Chapters in Cambridge Medical History.—III. William Heberden and the Age of Reason

WILLIAM HEBERDEN, THE YOUNGER 1767-1845

William Heberden, the younger, who was the second but only surviving son of William Heberden, the elder, was born in Cecil Street on March 23, 1767. His early education was received at the Charterhouse and at St. Johns College, Cambridge, of which he was a Fellow. He was a brilliant student and carried many of the coveted student honors. He received his A.B. in 1788 and his A.M. in 1791; he was incorporated on that degree as a member of Christ Church at Oxford. He received his M.B. in 1792 and his M.D. in 1795. He was admitted as a candidate of the College of Physicians in 1795; he was a Fellow in 1796, and censor in 1799 and 1808, Harveian orator in 1809, and Elect in 1823 in place of Dr. Baillie, deceased. All of these data are recorded by Munk in his Roll of the Royal College of

THE THERAPEUTIC INDICATION FOR THE USE OF ANTERIOR PITUITARY LOBE SUBSTANCE*

The practice of organotherapy is not a modern idea. It dates back many centuries when medicine was shrouded with mysticism and superstition. Progress was necessarily slow, as it had to advance along empirical lines. Although Hippocrates, Celsus and Dioscorides employed certain animal tissues in the treatment of diseases and the four London Pharmocopeias of 1618, 1650, 1677 and 1721 abounded with such remedies as blood, bile, bones, brains, excrement, fat, hearts, marrow, urine, etc., they finally fell into disrepute largely through Thomas Sydenham, who did not attach much importance to them, and later through William Heberden, who made a critical onslaught on polypharmacy and banished these remedies from the British Pharmacopeia in 1788. From this period until quite recently, when the modern sciences were beginning to be applied to medicine, little effort was made to re-introduce them. However, owing to a more comprehensive knowledge of the anatomy, histology and physiology of the glands of internal secre...

Right Hon. Sir Clifford Allbutt, K.C.B., F.R.S

THE sudden and quite unexpected death, after a -L few minutes' distress, early on the morning of February 22, of Sir Clifford Allbutt, Regius professor of physic at Cambridge since 1892, robs British medicine of its acknowledged leader, who from his scholarly accomplishments recalls Samuel Johnson's description of William Heberden the elder (1710–1801) as “Ultimus Romanorum, the last of the learned physicians.” He was indeed remarkable for his wide knowledge not only of modern but of ancient medicine, and for the broad horizon of his conception of the relations of medicine and how its future course should be directed. Thus he was ever insistent on the importance of a sound general educational basis on which medical studies should be engrafted, and he held strongly that universities should provide a liberal education and not lay themselves out for the more utilitarian qualification for the practice of any art or trade, and should not compete with hospital schools. His high standard was shown in a work-the result of many years' research—on “Greek Medicine in Rome” (1921). Since 1888 he had advocated the necessity for the study of comparative medicine and pathology, and happily he lived to see his own University start an Institute for this branch of research, and appropriately he was the first president of the Section of Comparative Medicine at the Royal Society of Medicine.

XLIV. A comparison of the heat of London and Edinburgh. By John Roebuck. M.D. F. R. S. in a letter to William Heberden, M.D. F. R. S

Sir, I delivered to you some time ago, a register of the thermometer at Hawkhill for ten years; but as these observations were made at eight o'clock in the morning and four in the afternoon, and yours at eight o'clock in the morning and two in the afternoon, the corresponding years of the morning's observations only admit of a comparison. It appears by you register, that the mean heat at London for nine years, from the end of 1763 to the end of 1772, at eight o'clock in the morning, was 47.4; and the mean heat at Hawkhill, during the same period of time, was 46°.

XXII. Observations on the aphides of linnæus, by Dr. William Richardson, of Ripon, Yorkshire: communicated by William Heberden, M. D. F. R. S

The learned Linnæus by his unwearied application having reduced the various productions of nature into one regular system, and clearly distinguished the numerous tribe of insects into their distinct classes and subdivisions, seems to me to have laid a more solid foundation for the natural history of these minute animals, than any other writer who has gone before him.

XXXV. Letter from the Hon. Daines Barrington, F. R. S. to William Heberden, M. D. F. R. S. giving an account of some experiments made in North Wales, to ascertain the different quantities of rain, which fell in the same time, at different heights

Sir, As I happened to be at the meeting of the Royal Society, when your experiments were read, relative to the different quantities of rain, which fell within receivers of the same dimensions at different heights from the ground; it occurred to me, that the same trials might be made at more disproportionate heights, though at the same distances from the surface of the earth.

III. A letter to William Heberden, M.D. Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians in London, and of the Royal Society, from Daniel Peter Layard, M.D. Physician to her Royal Highness the Princess Dowager of Wales, Member of the Royal College of Physicians in London, and of the Royal Societies of London and Gottingen; giving an account of the Somersham

III. A letter to William Heberden, M.D. Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians in London, and of the Royal Society, from Daniel Peter Layard, M.D. Physician to her Royal Highness the Princess Dowager of Wales, Member of the Royal College of Physicians in London, and of the Royal Societies of London and Gottingen; giving an account of the Somersham Water, in the county of Huntingdon; and transmitting a letter from Michael Morris, M.D. F. R. S. Member of the Royal College of Physicians in London, and Physician to the Westminister Hospital, to Dr. Layard, on the same subject. Dear Sir, At last I venture to lay before you the result of those experiments and observations, which I have made on the Somersham water. They were undertaken with your approbation, and pursued through your encouragement. To ascertain the contents of a mineral water, requires a repetition of the analysis; and notwithstanding the experiments have been repeated these fourteen years last past, either at the spring, at Huntingdon, or in London, and the effects of this water carefully observed in the many cases it has been drank, yet I could not before presume to offer you a positive determination, till I was convinced, by the trials of an abler and more competent judge, that I was not mistaken.

XVIII. Observations for settling the proportion, which the decrease of heat bears to the height of situation. Extracted from a letter of Thomas Heberden, M.D. F. R. S. to William Heberden, M.D. F. R. S

The remarkable transition from heat to cold in all seasons in proportion as we ascend the mountains here, induced me to make the following observations, with intention to discover if there subsists any regularity between the difference of heat and the elevation of situation.In order thereto, besides several observations made at different times, without any remarkable variation, I took the opportunity of a journey if some English gentlemen in October last, whose curiosity led them to ascend the mountain, called here Pico Ruivo, being the highest land on this island, the perpendicular height of which above the sea's surface is, according to Mr. de la Luc's method of mensuration by the barometer and thermometer, 5141 8/10 English feet.

XLII. A letter from Thomas Lawrence, M.D. to William Heberden, M.D. and F. R. S. concerning the effects of lightning, in Essex-street, on the 18th of June, 1764

Sir, I send you, as you desired, an account of the effects the lightning on Monday se'nnight had in my neighbourhood. The storm, which came from the south-east, broke first on the two houses at the bottom of Essex-street (which look from their south windows upon the river) and beat down several feet of the east-flue of the chimney on the west side, and separated the remainder down to the roof of the house from the western flue by a wide crack. From hence the lightning went higher up the street, and at the distance of about eighteen yards from the chimney just mentioned, went thro' the eves of a house, in a direction from the north-east to the southwest, as appeared by the breach, and forced the cieling of the garret inward by a kind of pointed bulge, without breaking the laths.

I. An account of a Mummy, inspected at London 1763. In a letter to William Heberden, M. D. F. R. S. From John Hadley, M.D. F. R. S

Dear Sir; On the 16th of December 1763, Dr. Wollaston, Dr. Blanshard, Dr. Hunter, Dr. Petit, the Rev. Mr. Egerton Leigh, and Mr. Hunter, met at my house; that we might together inspect a Mummy, which I had received from the museum of the Royal Society.

LXXXIII. Extract of a letter from Charlton Wollaston, M. D. F. R. S. to William Heberden, M. D. F. R. S. dated Bury St. Edmund‘s, April 13, 1762, relating to the case of mortification of limbs in a family at Wattisham in Suffolk

John Downing, a poor labouring man, who lives at Wattisham, a small village about sixteen miles from Bury, in January last had a wife and six children; the eldest, a girl, about fifteen years of age, the youngest about four months.

XXV. The case of a very long suppression of urine. by Ambrose Dawson, M. D. Communicated by William Heberden, M. D. F. R. S

R. W. aged 23 years, tall and wellmade, was seized, in the year 1755, with a weakness of one side, which soon went off, leaving only one knee weak and swelled ; for which she was admitted into St. George’s Hospital.

XXXV. Experiments on the Tourmalin: by Mr. Benjamin Wilson, F. R. S. In a letter to Dr. William Heberden, F. R. S.

Sir, I Have the pleasure to communicate to you some experiments made upon the <italic>Tourmalin</italic>, or <italic>Ashstone</italic>, which you were so kind as to procure me, together with some others, respecting the vitreous and resinous electricities, as they are called, and the observations I have made thereupon.

LVIII. Observations of the weather in Ma­deira, made by Dr. Thomas Heberden, and communicated by William Heberden, M. D. F. R. S

The thermometrical observations are made with Fahrenheit's thermometer, and the calculations deduced from two observations daily; at seven o' clock in the morning, and at three in the afternoon.