The role of neurasthenia in the formation of the physiotherapy profession.

Background: Neurasthenia was one of the most commonly diagnosed disorders in the later years of the 19th century. Its most widely used treatment, known as the Rest Cure, relied heavily on physical therapies, but little is known about the practitioners who administered the treatment. In this paper, I argue that the nurse-masseuses who delivered the massage and electricity so vital to the success of the Rest Cure, used the opportunity to develop approaches to treatment that would form the backbone of the physiotherapy profession in England after 1894. Methods: Extensive primary and secondary texts were drawn from a wide range of sources and critically reviewed. Findings: This study argues that the management of neurasthenic cases in the 1880s and 90s created the conditions necessary for the development of the profession's relationship with medicine and the establishment of new practice roles for women, and that these would play an important role in shaping the physiotherapy profession in Britain after 1894. Read through the critical sociological writings of Magali Sarfatti Larson and Anne Witz, I argue that the work of the nurse-masseuses can be seen as a complex gendered negotiation between the need to be deferential to the dominant male medical profession; distinct from emerging notions of the angelic, motherly nurse; obedient, technically competent and safe. The creation of a space in the clinic room for a third practitioner who could deliver a different form of care to the doctor or the nurse, established an approach to practice that physiotherapists would later adopt almost without amendment. Discussion: I argue that this approach owes much to the work done by nurse-massueses who established and tested its principles in treating cases of neurasthenia.

Joseph Franz Domin (1754-1819) and His Contribution to Electrotherapy.

Joseph Franz Domin (1754-1819) as the croatian theologian and philosopher is primary animist (vitalist), and in practice he has worked as physicist - mechanist, although the humoral theory at that time will be a foundation of medical philosophy more than twenty centuries from Hippocrates to the half of 19th century and Virchow's cellular theory. Besides his academic and researcher's work he has been working on electrotherapy of numerous conditions and diseases about which he has published (cephalea, neuralgia, paresis, plegias, pterigyum oculi, rheumatisms, Gicht, epilepsia, arthralgias, febres etc). The latter is undoubtedly progressive natural scientific theory which at that time have widely spread at Habsburgs Monarchy Universities and as proof between first and second Wien's medical school by integration of other scientific branches (physics and chemistry) in medicine. According to the various researchers Domin was an author of the first electrotherapy manual published in Zagreb, practitioner of electrotherapy in pregalvanic era in contemporary Austrian empire and for sure a scientist who have left a significant remark in contemporary applied physics in medicine, which continued in professional and scientific elaborations not until the end of the 19th century.

The Use of Electrotherapeutics in Ophthalmology.

PURPOSE: To present a perspective on the use of electrotherapeutics in the history of ophthalmology along with the development of novel contemporary ophthalmic instrumentation. DESIGN: Perspective study. METHODS: We reviewed historical journals, articles, and books discussing the use of electricity and electrotherapeutics in ophthalmology. RESULTS: Electrotherapeutic applications have been researched and used to treat ocular diseases as far back as the 18th century. By the 20th century, research in electrotherapeutics in ophthalmology had caught the eye of Edward Jackson, the first president of the American Academy of Ophthalmology and Otolaryngology and first editor of the present (third) series American Journal of Ophthalmology. Edward Jackson published an extensive review on this topic and reported a variety of modalities used to treat ocular diseases. CONCLUSIONS: While many early therapeutic uses of electricity did not produce effective and replicable results, studies on electrical stimulation of the eye provided the foundation for the development of clinically significant vision enhancing and restoring instrumentation.

History of Cranial Nerve-Implanted Stimulators in Otolaryngology.

This article aims to clearly understand the historical development of cranial nerve-implanted stimulators in otolaryngology. The authors also discuss cranial nerve history; initial theory of the functional concept of animal spirit; electrical nerve impulse theory; first electrical otolaryngology cranial nerve stimulation devices; and the development of implanted stimulators.

The Father of the Electrical Stimulation of the Ear.

: The Italian physicist Count Alessandro Volta, inventor of the electric battery, is considered the first scientist to have stimulated the ear with electricity, and the results of his experiments were presented in June 1800, at a meeting held by the Royal Society of London. Just recently, Mudry reported an electrical stimulation of the ear performed in 1748 by Benjamin Wilson (1721-1788), a British painter and scientist. After a thorough review of the literature available from the 18th century, we found that the first electrical stimulation of the ear was done in 1747, by a scientist in Bologna, Giuseppe Veratti.

Gastric Electrical Stimulator for Treatment of Gastroparesis.

Patients with gastroparesis sometimes suffer from intractable nausea and vomiting, abdominal pain, and bloating, as well as a host of other symptoms that can often be difficult to control. Initially, patients are treated conservatively; some do well with conservative management but unfortunately some do not. Over the years, studies have shown the benefits of gastric electrical stimulation, which often results in symptomatic improvement and improvement in gastric emptying times. This article discusses the history of gastric electrical stimulation and its use in clinical practice to help those suffering from gastroparesis that is refractory to conservative medical management.

Medical Machines as Symbols of Science?: Promoting Electrotherapy in Victorian Canada.

This article tackles a common assumption in the historiography of medical technology, that new medical instruments in the nineteenth century were universally seen as symbols of the scientific nature of medical practice. The article examines the strategies used by Jenny Trout, the first woman in Canada licensed to practice medicine, and J. Adams, a homeopathic physician, to advertise electrotherapy to the residents of Toronto in the 1870s and 1880s. While electrotherapy involved complex electrical technology, the doctors in this study did not draw attention to their instruments as proof of the legitimacy of their practice. In fact the technology is almost entirely absent from their promotional texts. While both doctors wanted their practice to be associated with scientific medicine, neither saw their instruments as immediately or obviously symbolic of science.

The Medical Battery in The United States (1870-1920): Electrotherapy at Home and in the Clinic.

This paper focuses on the history of a portable shock-producing electrotherapeutic device known as the medical battery (1870-1920), which provided both direct and alternating current and was thought to cure a wide variety of ailments. The product occupied a unique space at the nexus of medicine, consumerism and quackery: it was simultaneously considered a legitimate device by medical professionals who practiced electrotherapeutics, yet identical versions were sold directly to consumers, often via newspaper advertisements and with cure-all marketing language. Indeed, as I show in this paper, the line between what was considered a medical device and a consumer product was often blurred. Even though medical textbooks and journals never mentioned (much less promoted) the home use of electricity, every reputable electrotherapy instrument manufacturer sold a "family battery" for patients to use on themselves at home. While a handful of physicians spoke out against the use of electricity by the laity-as they felt it undermined the image of electrotherapy as a skilled medical procedure-existing evidence suggests that many physicians were likely recommending the home use of medical electricity to their patients. Taken together, this paper shows how the professional ideals of electrotherapeutics were not always aligned with physicians' actual practices.

[Electrotherapy for headaches]. / De elektrische behandeling van hoofdpijn.

Neuromodulation is being applied increasingly for the treatment of drug resistant headache. Although these techniques are often considered high-tech, electrotherapy for headache has a long history; electric fish have been used for headache treatment since the first century CE. During the eighteenth and nineteenth century, static electricity was a treatment for a wide variety of neuropsychiatric disorders including headache. The efficacy of electrotherapy, however, has been disputed continuously, since opponents were of the opinion that the positive results could be attributed to suggestion. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the electric treatment of headache gradually disappeared. In recent years, there has been a resurgence in the use of electrotherapy, along with the efficacy debate. With this historical review we wish to emphasize the importance of placebo-controlled studies, not only in terms of electrotherapy of headache, but also for the evaluation of neuromodulation for other disorders.

Brain Neuromodulation Techniques: A Review.

The modulation of brain function via the application of weak direct current was first observed directly in the early 19th century. In the past 3 decades, transcranial magnetic stimulation and deep brain stimulation have undergone clinical translation, offering alternatives to pharmacological treatment of neurological and neuropsychiatric disorders. Further development of novel neuromodulation techniques employing ultrasound, micro-scale magnetic fields and optogenetics is being propelled by a rapidly improving understanding of the clinical and experimental applications of artificially stimulating or depressing brain activity in human health and disease. With the current rapid growth in neuromodulation technologies and applications, it is timely to review the genesis of the field and the current state of the art in this area.

Electrotherapy in the treatment of patients affected by rabies: experiments conducted at the "Maggiore" hospital of Milan in 1865.

During the nineteenth century, the scientific context of rabies treatment was weak due to the lack of the literature on specific nosology of the rabies disease, and unspecific and ineffective therapy approaches. Electrotherapy already represented an important therapeutic approach for nervous system diseases, although not specifically for rabies. In the present paper, the authors discuss the use of electrotherapy in the treatment of humans affected by rabies in an experimental study conducted at the Maggiore Hospital of Milan, with the aim of establishing the discovery of a possible specific therapy. By analyzing the printed scientific sources available in the Braidense Library of Milan, the authors describe four experiments conducted on patients of different ages. Symptoms and effects both during and after the electrotherapy are also highlighted. The experiments demonstrated that electricity is not an effective therapy in the treatment of rabies, being rather able to cause serious functional and organic alterations in all the patients. Analyzing the Milanese experiments, the authors reported specific Italian history of a scientific and medical approach to rabies at the end of the 18th century, which led to the promotion of health education, reinforced prevention strategies and opened the way to the vaccination era.

Electrical stimulation of the brain and the development of cortical visual prostheses: An historical perspective.

Rapid advances are occurring in neural engineering, bionics and the brain-computer interface. These milestones have been underpinned by staggering advances in micro-electronics, computing, and wireless technology in the last three decades. Several cortically-based visual prosthetic devices are currently being developed, but pioneering advances with early implants were achieved by Brindley followed by Dobelle in the 1960s and 1970s. We have reviewed these discoveries within the historical context of the medical uses of electricity including attempts to cure blindness, the discovery of the visual cortex, and opportunities for cortex stimulation experiments during neurosurgery. Further advances were made possible with improvements in electrode design, greater understanding of cortical electrophysiology and miniaturisation of electronic components. Human trials of a new generation of prototype cortical visual prostheses for the blind are imminent. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled Hold Item.

NIKOLA TESLA AND MEDICINE: 160TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE BIRTH OF THE GENIUS WHO GAVE LIGHT TO THE WORLD - PART II.

INTRODUCTION: Nikola Tesla (1856- 1943) was a genius inventor and scientist, whose contribution to medicine is remarkable. Part I of this article reviewed special contributions of the world renowned scientist to the establishment of radiology as a new discipline in medicine. This paper deals with the use of Tesla currents in medicine. Tesla Currents in Medicine. Tesla's greatest impact on medicine is his invention of a transformer (Tesla coil) for producing high frequency and high voltage currents (Tesla currents). Tesla currents are used in diathermy, as they, while passing through the body, transform electrical energy into a therapeutic heat. In 1891, Tesla passed currents through his own body and was the first to experience their beneficial effects. He kept correspondence on electrotherapy with J. Dugan and S. H. Monell. In 1896, he used high frequency currents and designed an ozone generator for producing ozone, with powerful antiseptic and antibacterial properties. Tesla is famous for his extensive experiments with mechanical vibrations and resonance, examining their effects on the organ ism and pioneering their use for medical purposes. Tesla also designed an oscillator to relieve fatigue of the leg muscles. It is less known that Tesla's inventions (Tesla coil and wireless remote control) are widely used in modern medical equipment. Apart from this, wireless technology is nowadays widely applied in numerous diagnostic and therapeutic procedures. CONCLUSION: Nikola Tesla was the last Renais- sance figure of the modern era. Tesla bridged three centuries and two millennia by his inventions, and permanently indebted humankind by his epochal discoveries.