Treasures of the P.I. Nixon
Gold Stemmed Pessaries: A Shadow of the Past
September 11, 2017
Although the above medical device appears to just be a thingamajig from the local hardware store, it is not. It is a spring-stem wishbone pessary first developed in Germany in the 1880s and used through the late 1930s. Generally, today’s medical pessaries are used for three types of issues: a supportive device for organ prolapse, […]
August 2016 Historical Book of the Month
August 1, 2016
The August 2016 Historical Book of the Month highlights the oldest resource in the P.I. Nixon Medical Historical Library, De Medicina, published in Milan in 1481. Aulus Cornelius Celsus was a first-century Roman historian who compiled this set of treatises as a home health reference for wealthy Patrician families. It includes principles of good surgery, dental […]
July 2016 Historical Book of the Month
July 5, 2016
This month’s featured historical treasure is Osteographia, or The Anatomy of the Bones by William Cheselden. Published in London in 1753, this exquisite volume includes depictions of human and animal skeletons in interesting vignettes and in lifelike poses. His artists, Gerard van der Gucht and Jacob Schijnvoet, were the first to use the camera obscura […]
June 2016 Historical Book of the Month
June 2, 2016
The June 2016 Historical Book of the Month features the artistic masterpiece, Illustrations of the Great Operations of Surgery: Trepan, Hernia, Amputation, Aneurism, and Lithotomy by Charles Bell published in London in 1821. Sir Charles Bell was a Scottish surgeon, neurologist, and anatomist and namesake of such structures and phenomena as Bell’s Nerve, Bell’s Palsy, […]
May 2016 Historical Book of the Month
May 3, 2016
This month’s highlighted historical book from the P.I. Nixon Medical Historical Library is De Symmetria Partium in Rectis Formis Humanorum Corporum by Albrecht Dürer. This 1st Latin edition was translated from the original 1528 German edition and published in Nuremberg in 1532. Dürer was an influential artist, renowned print-maker, and respected contributor to the Northern […]
April 2016 Historical Book of the Month
April 4, 2016
In honor of Earth Day, this month’s chosen resource is Jacob Bigelow’s American Medical Botany, a 3-volume set published between 1817 and 1820 and one of the first titles published in the United States containing colored plant illustrations. Sixty beautiful colored plates were produced using a special process invented by Bigelow himself. Each entry includes […]
March 2016 Historical Book of the Month
March 8, 2016
The March 2016 Historical Book of the Month features this monumental work by Giovanni Battista Morgagni. De Sedibus, et Causis Morborum per Anatomen Indagatis Libri Quinque 2nd edition Published in Padua in 1765 The Seats and Causes of Diseases Investigated by Anatomy: In Five Books 1st English edition Published in London in 1769 Considered the […]
February 2016 Historical Book of the Month
February 3, 2016
This month’s featured historical book is Coomb’s Popular Phrenology by Frederick Coombs published in Boston in 1841. This monograph contains charts and illustrations of the exact phrenological – or skull – measurements of over fifty people. Phrenologists believed that each personality trait and mental faculty is represented in a specific area of the brain and […]
January 2016 Historical Book of the Month
January 7, 2016
The January 2016 Historical Book of the Month is Medicinal Experiments: or, A Collection of Choice Remedies, for the Most Part Simple and Easily Prepared, a collection of medicinal recipes compiled by Robert Boyle and published posthumously in London in 1692. Namesake of Boyle’s Law, Robert Boyle was one of the founders of modern chemistry, […]
December 2015 Historical Book of the Month
December 7, 2015
This month’s highlighted resource from the P.I. Nixon Medical Historical Library is An Essay on the Principle of Population as it Affects the Future Improvement of Society written under a pseudonym by Thomas Robert Malthus in 1798. In this statistical classic, Malthus concludes that population increases exponentially while the food supply only increases arithmetically, leading […]