Joseph Hermann Schmidt (14 June 1804 – 15 May 1852) was professor of

obstetrics Obstetrics is the field of study concentrated on pregnancy, childbirth and the postpartum period. As a medical specialty, obstetrics is combined with gynecology under the discipline known as obstetrics and gynecology (OB/GYN), which is a surg ...

in Berlin, and official of the Prussian cultural ministry.

Biography

He was born in 1804. In 1834 he became head of the Paderborn general hospital and eventually also of the

Paderborn Paderborn (; Westphalian: ''Patterbuorn'', also ''Paterboärn'') is a city in eastern North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, capital of the Paderborn district. The name of the city derives from the river Pader and ''Born'', an old German term for th ...

maternity clinic. He wrote a textbook of obstetrics widely used in

Prussia Prussia, , Old Prussian: ''Prūsa'' or ''Prūsija'' was a German state on the southeast coast of the Baltic Sea. It formed the German Empire under Prussian rule when it united the German states in 1871. It was ''de facto'' dissolved by an ...

. In 1842, together with

Pauline von Mallinckrodt Pauline Von Mallinckrodt (3 June 1817 - 30 April 1881) was a German Roman Catholic professed religious and the foundress of the Sisters of Christian Charity. Mallinckrodt was born into an aristocratic household as the daughter of a Lutheran fath ...

, he founded a private institution for the blind in Paderborn. In 1844 he became an official in the

Prussian Prussia, , Old Prussian: ''Prūsa'' or ''Prūsija'' was a German state on the southeast coast of the Baltic Sea. It formed the German Empire under Prussian rule when it united the German states in 1871. It was ''de facto'' dissolved by an ...

Ministry of Culture, the head of the gynecological section of the Berlin

Charité The Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin (Charité – Berlin University of Medicine) is one of Europe's largest university hospitals, affiliated with Humboldt University and Free University Berlin. With numerous Collaborative Research Ce ...

Clinic and professor of obstetrics at the Humboldt University of Berlin. He died in 1852 of a lung bleeding.

Legacy

A biography on Schmidt was published in 1939.

Controversy with Ignaz Semmelweis

Schmidt approved of obstetrical students having ready access to morgues in which they could spend time while waiting for the labor process. For this he had a controversy with

Ignaz Semmelweis Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis (; hu, Semmelweis Ignác Fülöp ; 1 July 1818 – 13 August 1865) was a Hungarian physician and scientist, who was an early pioneer of antiseptic procedures. Described as the "saviour of mothers", he discovered that t ...

who identified contamination as the principal source of high mortality rates from

puerperal fever Postpartum infections, also known as childbed fever and puerperal fever, are any bacterial infections of the female reproductive tract following childbirth or miscarriage. Signs and symptoms usually include a fever greater than , chills, lower a ...

. In an editorial in 1850 he wrote:

"A normal birth is often a slow process and it would be unreasonable to expect every young man .. to remain in the delivery room... In this respect it is very convenient that maternity wards are under the same roof as other clinics. tudentsare thus able to go into surgical or medical wards ... or they can go into the morgue from where they can be quickly called if significant change occurs." quoted in Semmelweis (1861):225-227

While he disagreed with Semmelweis that contaminated hands was ''the only cause'' of puerperal fever he thought that Semmelweis' observations regarding the positive effects of chlorine washings were "totally sufficient to warrant caution", and stated that "this inexpensive requirement will be adopted into practice at every obstetrical clinic." Semmelweis also scorned Schmidt of underreporting deaths from childbed fever: From 1844 to 1852 there were only 13 deaths out of 2,631 patients at the Charité. In the same period however, 442 patients "were transferred to other stations". Semmelweis was quick to point out that patients are transferred as soon as their health becomes doubtful.

Works

* Joseph Hermann Schmidt (1825) ''De corporum heterogeneorum in plantis animalibusque Genesi'' * Joseph Hermann Schmidt (1839) ''Lehrbuch der Geburtskunde für die Hebammen in den kgl. preußischen Staaten''

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Schmidt, Joseph Hermann 1804 births 1852 deaths Physicians of the Charité