CME INDIA Presentation by ⚜ Dr. M. Gowri Sankar, MD, Senior Assistant Professor, Dept. of General Medicine, Government Medical College and ESI Hospital, Coimbatore.
Today’s History Feature:
Dr. August Von Wassermann
(Feb 21, 1866 – Mar 16, 1925)
💠German Bacteriologist & Researcher
His contributions…
🔸Wassermann studied medicine at four different places – Universities of Erlangen, Vienna, Munich, and Strasbourg. Then he completed his Doctorate in Medicine in the year 1888. Subsequently, he joined as an unpaid assistant in the “Institute of Infectious Disease” in Berlin which was headed by Dr. Robert Koch at that time.
🔸Gradually, he became the Head of the Department of therapeutics and serum research in 1907. Later, he got promoted as the Director of the Department of Experimental therapy at the Kaiser-Wilhelm Institute, Berlin in 1913. He served there until his last days.
🔸By associating with Dr. Paul Ehrlich (a Nobel Prize winner for his contributions to immunology), he conducted many experiments for the development of Diptheria anti-toxin.
🔸His collaboration with Dr. Albert Niesser, (who discovered the causative agent of gonorrhea), led him to work on compliment fixation reactions and he developed antibody detection test to diagnose syphilis in 1906.
🔸Together they developed the test just one year after the discovery of the Syphilis causative Treponema pallidum.
🔸In fact, the WASSERMANN-NEISSER TEST was the predecessor of today’s Venereal Disease Research Laboratory (VDRL) test for the diagnosis of syphilis. Soon, it became a worldwide famous test and an invaluable method in diagnosis of Syphilis.
🔸Thereafter, Dr. Wassermann collaborated with the German bacteriologist Dr. Wilhelm Kolle and published the six-volume Handbook of Pathogenic Microorganisms.
🔸All his fabulous experiments and discoveries earned him the honour of EXTRAORDINARIUS at Dr. Robert Koch’s Institute of Infectious Disease.
A Day to Commemorate…
A Passionate Physician
Dr. August Von Wassermann 🙏🏼
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Sir title is Dr Johann Christian Reil instead Dr August!!
Thanx for sharing and keep updating 🙏🏽🙏🏽
Thank you for pointing this out. The same has been corrected.