FRANCOIS

See also:

• JOSEPH
• JOSEPH, COMTE DE (1785-1870)
• JOSEPH, FATHER (FRANCOIS LECLERC DU TREMBLAY) (1577-1638)

JOSEPH

See also:

• VICTOR
• VICTOR, GAIUS JULIUS (4th cent. A.D.)
• VICTOR, SEXTUS AURELIUS

VICTOR

See also:

• FRANCOIS JOSEPH VICTOR BROUSSAIS (1772-1838)

BROUSSAIS (1772-1838)  , French physician, was born at St Maio on the 17th of December 1772 . From his father, who was also a physician, he received his first instructions in medicine, and he studied for some years at the college of Dinan . At the age of seventeen he entered one of the newly-formed republican regiments, but ill-health compelled him to withdraw after two years . He resumed his medical studies, and then obtained an appointment as surgeon in the navy . In 1799 he proceeded to Paris, wherein 1803 he graduated as M.D . In 1805 he again joined the army in a professional capacity, and served in Germany and Holland . Returning to Paris in 1808 he published his Histoire des phlegmasies ou inflammations chroniques; then left again for active service in Spain . In 1814 he returned to Paris, and was appointed assistant-professor to the military hospital of the Val-de-Grace, where he first promulgated his peculiar doctrines on the relation between " life " and " stimulus," and on the physiological interdependence and sympathies of the various organs . His lectures were attended by great numbers of students, who received with the utmost enthusiasm the new theories which he propounded . In 1816 he published his Examen de la doctrine medicale generalement adoptee, which drew down upon its author the hatred of the whole medical faculty of Paris; but by degrees his doctrines triumphed, and in 1831 he was appointed professor of general pathology in the academy of medicine . In 1828 he published a work De l'irritat"ion et de la folie, and towards the end of his life he attracted large audiences by his lectures on phrenology . He died at Vitry-sur-Seine on the 17th of November 1838 .