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Resource Type:
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Asset Name:
E005213 - Leriche, René (1879 - 1955)
Title:
Leriche, René (1879 - 1955)
Author:
Royal College of Surgeons of England
Identifier:
RCS: E005213
Publisher:
London : Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date:
2014-04-02
Description:
Obituary for Leriche, René (1879 - 1955), Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of England.
Language:
English
Source:
Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Full Name:
Leriche, René
Date of Birth:
12 October 1879
Place of Birth:
Roanne, France
Date of Death:
29 December 1955
Place of Death:
Cassis, France
Occupation:
Titles/Qualifications:
Hon FRCS 10 March 1927

MD Lyon 1906

Membre, Institut de France (Académie des Sciences) 4 June 1945

Grand Officier, Légion d'Honneur
Details:
Born at Roanne, central France on 12 October 1879 the son of a lawyer; his father's father and brother being surgeons, he graduated at Lyons in 1906 and was Chef de clinique chirurgicale there till 1909. During the war of 1914-18 he worked in military hospitals in Paris and was chosen for the staff of the surgical training hospital at Bouleuse near Rheims, where he made numerous contacts with American surgeons. After the war he became Chirurgien des Hopitaux at Lyons and in 1920 lecturer in experimental surgery in the University. He was called to Strasbourg as professor of clinical surgery in 1924, and made his clinic an essential place of pilgrimage for surgeons from all over the world. He returned to Lyons in 1932 as professor of surgical pathology, but was reappointed professor of surgery at Strasbourg in 1934. He was appointed in 1937 to the famous chair of medicine at the College de France, once occupied by Claude Bernard, but continued to practise at Strasbourg while lecturing in Paris until 1941. Leriche carried on the work of Bernard in searching for physiological explanation of the mechanism of disease, but like John Hunter, he applied the results of his researches in his own surgical practice. He was deeply interested in the problem of pain, and gave surgeons a fuller understanding of the nervous system. His operation of periarterial sympathectomy was described in the journal *Lyon Chirurgical*, vol 10, 1913. In later years most of his attention was directed to the bones and the blood-vessels. His book *Problèmes de la physiologie normale et pathologique de 1'os* appeared in 1926, the first of several books which he wrote on this subject. *L'Artériectomie dans les artérites oblitérantes* was published in 1933, and was followed by a series of important monographs on surgery of the arteries. His outstanding volume *La chirurgie de la douleur* appeared in 1937, and was translated into English by Archibald Young of Glasgow. He worked in military hospitals at Lyons when war broke out again in 1939, but during the German occupation of France he transferred his work to Portugal. He was elected to the Académie des Sciences in 1945 and gave the surplus of the fund subscribed by friends for his ceremonial sword to found a prize in vascular surgery under the Société internationale de Chirurgie, of which he was President in 1951. He was President of the French Congress of Surgery in 1933 and of the Académie de Chirurgie in 1952. He was awarded the quinquennial Prix Lannelongue, for the most outstanding contribution to the advance of surgery, by an international jury through the Académie de Chirurgie. The Peronist regime in Argentina awarded him the first Peron prize for services to humanity, and with this he founded two travelling fellowships for young surgeons from Paris and Lyons to study in Argentina. He was elected an Honorary Fellow of the College on 10 March 1927, and in 1939 he was awarded the Lister Medal, giving the Oration at the College on 5 April on "The Listerian idea in the year 1939". Leriche worked like Lister in the wards and the laboratory, and like him inspired devotion among colleagues and pupils by natural simplicity and stimulating intelligence. For many years he held a unique place among surgeons in Western Europe and the Americas, especially Latin America, distinguished alike as surgeon, scientist, and thinker. He was withal modest and unaffected, and was an accomplished speaker and writer. Above all he was a true physician, whole-heartedly at the service of his patients. He valued his connections with Britain, where the professional bodies delighted to honour him and where he had many personal friends. Only six months before his death he sent the College Library his latest book *Bases de la chirurgie physiologique*, inscribed "En cordial homage". Madame Leriche was a medical graduate; she collaborated with her husband and translated foreign surgical papers for him. She also supported him in hospitality in Paris and Cassis on the Mediterranean to which he retired in 1953. He died there on 29 December 1955, aged 76. The memorial ceremonies were held in Paris on 18 January 1956.
Sources:
*Souvenirs de ma vie morte* (Autobiography) 1956

*Mem Acad Chir, Paris* 1956, 81, 54-57 allocution by the President, Pierre Moulonguet and tribute from Sir Gordon Gordon-Taylor

*Lyon chir* 1956, 52, 1-492 Hommage à Réne Leriche, with portraits, eight appreciations and review of his work by Pierre Wertheimer

*CR Acad Sci Paris* 1956, 242, 22-27 by Louis Bazy

*Paris-Match* 21 January 1956, no 354, pp 36-45 by Jean Diwo with numerous coloured portrait photo¬graphs

*The Times* 30 December 1955 p 11 b, and 3 January 1956 p 9 a appreciation by H W S Wright

*Brit med J* 1956, 1, 51 with portrait and appreciation by Sir Gordon Gordon-Taylor, and p. 168 by Donald Patey

*Lancet* 1942, 2, 316 and 1956, 1, 56 with informal portrait and appreciation by SA
Rights:
Copyright (c) The Royal College of Surgeons of England
Collection:
Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format:
Obituary
Format:
Asset
Asset Path:
Root/Lives of the Fellows/E005000-E005999/E005200-E005299
Media Type:
Unknown