'Treatise on the Spinal Marrow and its Diseases' (Anatomy, functions and general considerations on its diseases) by Ollivier d' Angers CP (1796-1845)

Abstract

Study design: Collecting and analyzing all possible documents by internet, and consulting medical libraries in different countries.

Objective: To focus on the work of Ollivier d'Angers who, in the beginning of the 19th century, spent most of his professional life studying the spinal cord, marrow (SM), or medulla spinalis, and publishing the first comprehensive treatise on the subject in 1824.

Setting: ParaDoc database, Swiss Paraplegic-Centre, 6207 Nottwil, Switzerland, in collaboration with Paul Dollfus, ISCoS/Paradoc, Mulhouse, France.

Results: Some of d'Angers's clinical descriptions, observations and also pathologic findings, described in the successive editions of his treatise, were very much in advance of his time.

Conclusions: To our knowledge, this was the first comprehensive treatise, in 1824, at least in France. It gave a clear picture on the matter of the SM and in that period of medical history.