Collection of important offprints, publications and correspondence (signed letters etc.) by Nobel Laureate Werner Forssmann, many of which are inscribed and signed by Forssmann to his colleague, irish cardiologist and clinical scientist, Eoin O'Brien. The collection includes: 1. A signed / inscribed version of Forssmann's first offprint-edition of his Nobel-Lecture: "Die Rolle der Herzkatheterung und Angiocardiographie in der Entwicklung der Modernen Medizin" (pages 177 - 181, Stockholm, 1957, SIGNED and beautifully inscribed to O'Brien in July 1976) / 2. A signed, original Offprint: "The Evolution of Modern Cardiology" (11 pages, SIGNED Offprint from "Perspectives in Biology and Medicine - Vol.12, No.1, Autumn 1968) / 3. A Signed / Inscrib

[Cardiac catheterization / Nobel Price Lecture] - Forssmann, Dr. Werner.

Published by Germany, 1956 - 1976., 1976

About this Item

Octavo. Very good condition with only minor signs of wear. Signed and inscribed items by Forssmann are of great rarity. The Nobel Lecture alone is very scarce and very rarely available signed. Werner Theodor Otto Forßmann (Forssmann in English; 29 August 1904 1 June 1979) was a German researcher and physician from Germany who shared the 1956 Nobel Prize in Medicine (with Andre Frederic Cournand and Dickinson W. Richards) for developing a procedure that allowed cardiac catheterization. In 1929, he put himself under local anesthesia and inserted a catheter into a vein of his arm. Not knowing if the catheter might pierce a vein, he put his life at risk. Forssmann was nevertheless successful; he safely passed the catheter into his heart. Forssmann was born in Berlin on 29 August 1904. Upon graduating from Askanisches Gymnasium, he entered the University of Berlin to study medicine, passing the State Examination in 1929. He hypothesized that a catheter could be inserted directly into the heart, for such applications as directly delivering drugs, injecting radiopaque dyes, or measuring blood pressure. The fear at the time was that such an intrusion into the heart would be fatal. To prove his point, he decided to try the experiment on himself. In 1929, while working in Eberswalde, he performed the first human cardiac catheterization. He ignored his department chief and persuaded the operating-room nurse in charge of the sterile supplies, Gerda Ditzen, to assist him. She agreed, but only on the promise that he would do it on her rather than on himself. However, Forssmann tricked her by restraining her to the operating table and pretending to locally anaesthetise and cut her arm whilst actually doing it on himself. He anesthetized his own lower arm in the cubital region and inserted a urinary catheter into his antecubital vein, threading it partly along before releasing Ditzen (who at this point realised the catheter was not in her arm) and telling her to call the X-ray department. They walked some distance to the X-ray department on the floor below where under the guidance of a fluoroscope he advanced the catheter the full 60 cm into his right ventricular cavity. This was then recorded on X-Ray film showing the catheter lying in his right atrium. The head clinician at Eberswalde, although initially very annoyed, recognized Werner's discovery when shown the X-rays; he allowed Forssmann to carry out another catheterization on a terminally ill woman whose condition improved after being given drugs in this way. An unpaid position was created for Forssmann at the Berliner Charité Hospital, working under Ferdinand Sauerbruch, although once Sauerbruch saw his paper, he was dismissed for continuing without his approval. Sauerbruch commented, "You certainly can't begin surgery in that manner". Facing such disciplinary action for self-experimentation, he was initially forced to leave the Charité, but was later re-instated until again being forced to leave in 1932 for not meeting scientific expectations. His surgical skills were noted, however, and he was recommended to another hospital where he worked for a while before leaving in 1933 after marrying Dr. Elsbet Engel, a specialist in urology there. Finding it difficult to get a job with his reputation, he quit cardiology and took up urology. He then went on to study urology under Karl Heusch at the Rudolf Virchow Hospital in Berlin. Later, he was appointed Chief of the Surgical Clinic at both the City Hospital at Dresden-Friedrichstadt and the Robert Koch Hospital in Berlin. From 1932 to 1945, he was a member of the Nazi Party. At the start of World War II, he became a medical officer. In the course of his service, he rose to the rank of Major, until he was captured and put into a U.S. POW camp. Upon his release in 1945, he worked as a lumberjack and then as a country medic in the Black Forest with his wife. In 1950, he began practice as a urologist in Bad Kreuznach. During the time of his im.

Seller Inventory # 31822AB

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Collection of important offprints, publications and correspondence (signed letters etc.) by Nobel Laureate Werner Forssmann, many of which are inscribed and signed by Forssmann to his colleague, irish cardiologist and clinical scientist, Eoin O'Brien. The collection includes: 1. A signed / inscribed version of Forssmann's first offprint-edition of his Nobel-Lecture: "Die Rolle der Herzkatheterung und Angiocardiographie in der Entwicklung der Modernen Medizin" (pages 177 - 181, Stockholm, 1957, ...
• Publisher: Germany, 1956 - 1976.
• Publication Date: 1976
• Signed: Signed by Author(s)
• Seller catalogs:
  • Varia