Emil Theodor Kocher

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Swiss surgeon (1841–1917)

Kocher, an engineer's son from Bern in Switzerland, graduated in medicine from the university there in 1865. He later studied surgery in Berlin, Paris, and in London under Joseph Lister, and in Vienna under Theodor Billroth. Kocher served as professor of clinical surgery at the University of Bern from 1872 until his retirement in 1911 although he continued as head of the University surgical clinic until his death.

Using the antiseptic techniques developed by Lister, Kocher, following the initiative of Billroth, played an important role in developing the operation of thyroidectomy for the treatment of goiter, a not uncommon complaint in Switzerland. By 1914 Kocher was able to report a mortality of only 4.5% from over 2000 operations.

Earlier however, Kocher discovered that while technically successful the operation was responsible for the unnecessary ruin of many lives. In 1883, he found to his horror that something like a third of his patients who had undergone thyroidectomy were suffering from what was politely termed operative myxedema; they had in fact been turned into cretins once the source of the thyroid hormone (thyroxine) had been removed. Kocher showed that such tragedies could be prevented by not removing the whole of the thyroid, for even a small portion possesses sufficient physiological activity to prevent such appalling consequences.

For this work Kocher was awarded the 1909 Nobel Prize for physiology or medicine.

Swiss surgeon. He won a 1909 Nobel Prize for work on the thyroid gland.

Emil Theodor Kocher
Emil Theodor Kocher
Born	August 25, 1841 Berne, Switzerland
Died	July 27, 1917 (aged 75)
Profession	Surgeon
Institutions	University of Berne
Known for	Developer of Thyroid surgery
Notable prizes	Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (1909)

Emil Theodor Kocher (August 25, 1841 – July 27, 1917) was a Swiss physician, medical researcher, and Nobel laureate for his work in the physiology, pathology and surgery of the thyroid.

Kocher was born in Berne, Switzerland. He studied in Zürich, Berlin, London and Vienna, and obtained his doctorate in Berne in 1865. In 1872, he succeeded Georg Albert Lücke as Ordinary Professor of Surgery and Director of the University Surgical Clinic at the Inselspital in Berne. He published works on a number of subjects other than the thyroid gland including hemostasis, antiseptic treatments, surgical infectious diseases, on gunshot wounds, acute osteomyelitis, the theory of strangulated hernia, and abdominal surgery. His new ideas on the thyroid gland were initially controversial but his successful treatment of goiter with a steadily decreasing mortality rate soon won him recognition. The prize money, from the Nobel prize he received, helped him to establish the Kocher Institute in Berne.

A number of instruments (for example the craniometer^[1] ) and surgical techniques (for example, the Kocher manoeuvre) are named after him, as well as the Kocher-Debre-Semelaigne syndrome.

References

1. ^ Schültke, Elisabeth (May. 2009). "Theodor Kocher's craniometer". Neurosurgery (United States) 64 (5): 1001–4; discussion 1004-5. doi:10.1227/01.NEU.0000344003.72056.7F. PMID 19404160. 

External links

• Nobel Lectures, Physiology or Medicine 1901-1921, Elsevier, Amsterdam, 1967
• Universität Bern - Theodor Kocher at www.tki.unibe.ch
• Universität Bern - Theodor Kocher Institut - Home at www.tki.unibe.ch
• Emil Theodor Kocher

v • d • e Nobel Laureates in Physiology or Medicine Emil Behring (1901) · Ronald Ross (1902) · Niels Finsen (1903) · Ivan Pavlov (1904) · Robert Koch (1905) · Camillo Golgi / Santiago Ramón y Cajal (1906) · Alphonse Laveran (1907) · Ilya Mechnikov / Paul Ehrlich (1908) · Emil Kocher (1909) · Albrecht Kossel (1910) · Allvar Gullstrand (1911) · Alexis Carrel (1912) · Charles Richet (1913) · Robert Bárány (1914) · Jules Bordet (1919) · August Krogh (1920) · Archibald Hill / Otto Meyerhof (1922) · Frederick Banting / John Macleod (1923) · Willem Einthoven (1924) Complete roster · 1901–1925 · 1926–1950 · 1951–1975 · 1976–2000 · 2001–present

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