Biographical detailsThis section has been translated automatically.
- (¤ 1822, 1864) Dermatologist and venereologist. Baerensprung was born on 30.3.1822 in Berlin as the son of the then Lord Mayor Friedrich Wilhelm von Baerensprung. After attending the Coelln High School from 1840, he studied medicine and natural sciences at the universities of Berlin and Halle. His teachers included Johann Lucas Schönlein, J Müller, David Peter Krukenberg and the surgeon Ernst Blasius. 1843 Doctorate in Halle on "Observationes microscopicae de penitore tumorum nonnullorum structura". Afterwards further training in Prague in pathological anatomy. 1845 Assistant position in Krukenberg's "Hallische Klinik für innere Medizin". 1847 Establishment as general practitioner in Halle. 1848 Habilitation at the University of Halle. Subject: "De transitu medicamentorum praesertim hydrargyri per tegumenta corporis externa".
- 1848 publication of his monograph "Contributions to the anatomy and pathology of human skin". The work identifies him as one of the founders of modern dermatohistopathology. 1850 Foundation of a private clinic, which was very quickly accepted by the population. In 1853, he was appointed to the Charité hospital in Berlin as the head physician of the department for venereal diseases. From 1857 he was an associate professor at the University of Berlin. He was not granted a full professorship. 1858 Foundation of the dermatological clinic at the Charité/ Berlin. Pioneering clinical description of erythrasma. After 1860 important work on the pathogenesis of herpes zoster.
- The anatomical justification of "neuritic dermatoses" given by Baerensprung by the proof of spinal ganglion disease in herpes zoster can be regarded as meritorious. In addition, he achieved success in alleviating Prurigo through conscientious care in his clinic. Von Baerensprung tried to further develop the method of syphilidation (a kind of "vaccination method" or "inoculation method") which was applied for the first time in France but without success. Some of his experimental approaches were ethically incomprehensible and irresponsible from today's perspective. For example, he initiated an ethically extremely reprehensible series of experiments at the Charité, in which healthy (!) women were infected with syphilis. v. Baerensprung is considered the actual founder of the duality theory of chancre and syphilis (see John Hunter below). His most important doctrine was: "neither gonorrhea nor chancre belong to syphilis" (see Proksch).
- Fierce literary disputes caused von Baerensprung's vehement rejection of mercury therapy for syphilis. In 1862 he was transferred to the Hohenheim institution near Kiel with a dementia paralytica (as a result of a syphilis illness). Here he completed his work "On Hereditary Syphilis" (1864), a few weeks later he drowned himself in the Baltic Sea.
LiteratureThis section has been translated automatically.
- Jüttner, Christine (1997) The Berlin dermatologist Friedrich Wilhelm Felix von Bärensprung (1822-1864) and his merits in research and teaching, Diss. med.
- Proksch JK (1905) The history of venereal diseases. Published by Peter Hanstein, Bonn 771-779
Prof. Dr. med. Peter Altmeyer