Themistocles Gluck: biographic remarks emphasising his contributions to laryngectomy
- نوع فایل : کتاب
- زبان : انگلیسی
- مؤلف : Benedikt J. Folz · Carl E. Silver · Alessandra Rinaldo · AlWo Ferlito
- چاپ و سال / کشور: 2011
Description
Themistocles Gluck was one of the most imaginative representatives of early modern surgery. During his life he developed landmark innovations in many diVerent areas of surgery. His ideas were often far ahead of his time, a circumstance, which exposed him to severe criticism by his peers. In an era before surgical specialization, he contributed to several Welds of surgery. He performed the Wrst total joint replacement in Berlin, in 1890 with a hinged ivory prosthetic knee, and developed models for replacement of shoulder, elbow, and wrist. These eVorts had remarkable short term success, but invariably failed in the long term because of infection. A long standing conXict with the powerful Ernst von Bergmann, seriously damaged Gluck’s reputation, which he eventually regained, mostly because of his contributions to surgery of the head and neck; in particular, total laryngectomy. The results of laryngectomy in the decade after Billroth’s Wrst successful operation were dismal. Through Glucks reWnements, developed in cooperation with his coworkers Johannes Soerensen, the results of laryngectomy improved slowly but inexorably, and mortality rates were reduced from 56 to 2%. In his lifetime, Gluck made signiWcant contributions to head and neck surgery, some of which are still currently valid. This publication gives an outline of Gluck’s remarkable biography
Eur Arch Otorhinolaryngol (2011) 268:1175–1179, Received: 28 February 2011 / Accepted: 24 March 2011 / Published online: 17 April 2011 © Springer-Verlag 2011
