Sydenham, thomas

(¤ 1624,  1689) Thomas Sydenham was born on 10 September 1624 in Wynford Eagle (near Dorchester, Dorset) and died on 29 December 1689 in London. He was the most important English doctor of his time and was also known as the "English Hippocrates". Sydenham began his medical studies in Oxford at Magdalene Hall College in 1642. He interrupted his studies already after 2 months to go to war at Cromwell's side against Charles I. In 1645 he returned to the university. 1648 he received the "M.B. - Bachelor of Medicine". In 1655 he settled as a "general practitioner" in the district of Westminster in London. In 1659 he left England to pursue further medical studies at the University of Montpellier. Sydenham presented, among other things, a series of classical descriptions of infectious diseases, including Chorea minor, which he first described in 1686 and which was also named after him. He also dealt with neurological, dermatological and psychiatric diseases such as scarlet fever (1676), chickenpox, epilepsy and hysteria. Sydenham himself suffered from gout and described this disease in detail. He also studied in detail the chickenpox epidemics in London. In 1666 he published his main work "Methodeus curandi febres". From the 3rd edition in 1676 it appeared under the title "Observationes medicae". In his works of 1683 he distinguished for the first time between rheumatism and gout.