The history of coronary heart disease / J.O. Leibowitz.

  • Leibowitz, J. O. (Joshua Otto), 1895-
Date:
1970
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Credit: The history of coronary heart disease / J.O. Leibowitz. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    in the curves, but on the whole remained, dissatisfied with the capillary- electrometer. Primarily interested in the physiological aspects, Eintho ven strove also to attain an accuracy sufficient for application to human beings and to clinical practice. In 1900, he published his paper 'On the normal human electrocardiogram and on the capillar-electrometric examination of some heart patients.' Here he was able to demonstrate that tracings obtained from patients suffering from heart disease were different from those taken from normal patients. He finally abandoned the capillary electrometer which had required correction of the curve obtained, and was able to announce his invention of the string gal vanometer. The paper, ' The galvanometric registration of the human electrocardiogram etc.' was published in German in the leading physio logical journal of the time 12 and a brief quotation from it follows: ' I have tried to find a way to avoid as far as possible the con struction of a new curve; in so doing I have at length devised an instrument which satisfies many requirements and is espe cially suitable to inscribe the human electrocardiogram directly in almost its exact proportions. The essential part of this instrument—the string galvano meter—is a thin silver-coated quartz fibre, which is stretched like a string in a strong magnetic field. If an electric current is led through this quartz fibre, the fibre shows a movement which can be observed and photographed by means of a con siderable magnification, just as in the case with the movement of the mercury in the capillary electrometer. It is possible to regulate the sensitivity of the galvanometer very accurately within wide bounds by tightening and loosening the string' (p. 474). Einthoven, who had a medical degree and never engaged in medical practice but was a physiologist all his life, became director of the Physiological Institute of Leyden University. However, he was eager to provide the medical profession with a workable and important tool to serve the needs of daily practice. His family background may well have increased his desire to see his discovery applied clinically, since he was the son and grandson of physicians. 13 This desire came to fruition 12 Pflüger''s Arch. ges. Physiol., 1903, 99, 472. 13 His grandfather was a Jewish doctor in the Dutch West Indies. In the obituary in the New English Journal of Medicine and Surgery (1927) the statement was made for the first time in medical literature that Einthoven was ' born from Jewish parents Being interested in this item, after making enquiries as to the writer of the unsigned obituary, we were informed by Dr. Viets of Boston that it was written by the late John F. Fulton, with whom we had been privileged to maintain many most agreeable contacts. Unable to trace further the source of Dr. Fulton's information, we pursued our enquiry, and