Information about Ambroise Pare

Ambroise Paré (Born in Bourg-Hersent, near Laval, France, c.1510 – Paris, December 20, 1590) was a French surgeon, the great official royal surgeon for kings Henry II, Francis II, Charles IX and Henry III, is considered by some as one of the Fathers of Surgery. He was a leader in surgical techniques, especially the treatment of wounds. He was also an anatomist as well as the inventor of several surgical instruments.

Biography

After his apprenticeship at the Hôtel-Dieu in Paris between 1533 and 1536, Paré soon became a military surgeon during the campaigns in Italy. In this occasion, he discovered a remedy against the pain of the wounded by firearms. Much of Paré's experience with wounds was acquired on the battlefield.

In 1545 and 1553, he published the first and second editions of his treatise on the treatment of wounds by firearms and arrows, considered a milestone of surgical art. In 1561, Paré published his universal anatomy of the human body. Paré published other scholarly treatises on the treatment of wounds and illnesses.

After a battle Ambroise Paré used egg yolk, oil of roses, and turpentine for boiling oil for people that could not afford the boiling oil. This was an ancient roman turpentine remedy. He then discovered the next day that it was more efficient at healing the wounds than the boiling oil. He also introduced the ligature of arteries instead of cauterization during amputation. Although ligatures often spread infection, it cannot be denied that this was an important breakthrough in surgical practice. During his work with injured soldiers, Pare documented the pain experienced by amputees which they perceive as sensation in the amputated limb. He believed that phantom pain occurred in the brain, not the remnants of the limb, which is still the consensus of the medical community today. [1]

He was also an important figure in the progress of obstetrics in the middle of the 16th century. He revived the operation of podalic version and showed how, by means of it, surgeons could often rescue an infant even in cases of head presentation, instead of breaking it up and extracting it piecemeal. He was ably seconded by his pupil Guillemeau, who translated his work into Latin, and at a later period himself wrote a treatise on midwifery, an English translation of which was published in 1612 with the title Child Birth; or, The Happy Deliverie of Women.

In 1552, Paré was accepted into royal service of the Valois Dynasty under Henry II. The good surgeon stayed in this service to the end of his life in 1590; Paré was however unable to treat the king's fatal blow to the head, received during a tournament. On August 24, 1572, Paré was called to the royal palace where the king locked him in a clothes closet with his own hand. That was the day of theSt. Bartholomew's Day Massacre, when Catholics began their assault on the Huguenots. Paré was Huguenot and Charles IX saved him.

A collection of his works was published at Paris in 1575, and they were afterwards frequently reprinted. Several editions have appeared in German and Dutch, and among the English translations was that of Thomas Johnson (1665).

Bezoar Stone experiment

In 1565, Ambroise Paré described an experiment to test the properties of the Bezoar Stone. At the time, the Bezoar stone was deemed to be able to cure the effects of any poison, but Paré believed this was impossible. It happened that a cook at Paré's court was caught stealing fine silver cutlery. In his shame, the cook agreed to be poisoned. He then used the Bezoar stone to no great avail as he died in agony days after. Paré had proved that the Bezoar stone could not cure all poisons as was commonly believed at the time.

Quotations

• "Je le pansai, Dieu le guérit", which means "I dressed him, and God healed him."
• "Guérir quelquefois, soulager souvent, consoler toujours", which means "Cure occasionally, relieve often, console always".

External links

• Biography (in French)
• Page through a virtual copy of Pare's Oeuvres