[Vincent Priessnitz and the Vienna Medical School]

Abstract

Vinzenz Priessnitz, a small-scale farmer from Gräfenberg (Austrian Silesia), from the 1820's on aroused worldwide interest in hydrotherapy, on the basis of purely empirical observations on his regimen of compresses, head, eye and foot baths, hip baths and full baths, showers and cold-water cures. The new hydrotherapeutic impulse from Gräfenberg also influenced the Vienna Medical School. Wilhelm Winternitz, who became a lecturer in hydrotherapy in 1864, is referred to as the "father of scientific hydrotherapy".