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- Title
Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809--1894) and Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis (1818--1865): Preventing the Transmission of Puerperal Fever.
- Authors
Lane, Hilary J.; Blum, Nava; Fee, Elizabeth
- Abstract
The article examines the public health works of physicians Oliver Wendell Holmes and Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis in preventing the transmission of puerperal fever, also known as childbed fever. Holmes graduated from Harvard in 1836 and published the booklet "Puerperal Fever, As a Private Pestilence" in 1855. He reported that puerperal fever was transmitted to patients by physicians with unwashed hands. Semmelweis graduated from the University of Vienna in 1844 and published the book "The Etiology, Concept, and Prophylaxis of Childbed Fever" in 1861. Semmelweis found a relationship between childbed fever and physicians who failed to wash their hands after autopsies.
- Subjects
PUERPERAL septicemia; HOLMES, Oliver Wendell, 1809-1894; SEMMELWEIS, Ignac Fulop, 1818-1865; HAND washing; HEALTH of physicians; INFECTIOUS disease transmission
- Publication
American Journal of Public Health, 2010, Vol 100, Issue 6, p1008
- ISSN
0090-0036
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.2105/AJPH.2009.185363