Joseph Lister, 1st Baron Lister

For more information on Joseph Lister, visit Britannica.com.

View more Science videos

British physician (1827–1912)

Lister, the son of Joseph Jackson Lister, was born at Upton in England and educated at Quaker schools before entering University College, London, in 1843. University College was, at the time, the only English university open to religious dissenters. After graduating in arts, Lister studied medicine, obtaining his MB in 1852. He then served as assistant to the leading Scottish surgeon James Syme at the Royal Infirmary, Edinburgh, from 1854 until 1860 when he was appointed professor of surgery at Glasgow University. Lister returned to Edinburgh in 1869 as professor of clinical surgery but in 1877 became professor of surgery at King's College, London, serving there until his retirement in 1892.

In 1867 Lister published two short but revolutionary papers, which introduced the principles of antiseptic surgery into medicine. In 1846 he had been present when Robert Liston had first successfully used ether as an anesthetic in England. Yet this, apart from making surgery tolerable for both patient and surgeon, had not greatly advanced the profession. The full potential of anesthesia did not develop because of the high mortality produced by the infection that inevitably followed major surgery. The inevitable consequence was that a surprisingly small amount of surgery was actually attempted, even in the major centers with ready access to anesthetics.

Lister acknowledged the twin sources of his innovations in his 1867 papers. The first and most important were the writings of Louis Pasteur. These revealed the cause of the widespread surgical sepsis to be the germs present in the air. To control them Lister reported that he had been impressed by an account of the effects produced by carbolic acid on sewage in Carlisle. Carbolic acid (phenol, C₆H₅OH) is a weak acid derived from benzene. Although Lister's first attempt to use it as an antiseptic in March 1865 ended in failure he persisted and in August dressed a compound fracture of the leg, that is one in which the skin has been broken, with a piece of lint dipped in liquid carbolic acid. The wound healed well.

This encouraged Lister to introduce the carbolic acid dressings into his regular surgical procedure. By 1870 he claimed that mortality for amputations had dropped from over 40% to 15%. He later analyzed his figures for his Edinburgh period, reporting that from 1871 to 1877 he performed 725 major operations with a mortality of only 5.1%.

Another of Lister's major innovations was his introduction, in 1869, of cat-gut ligatures to replace the traditional silk thread, which was a major source of infection. Lister's experiments showed that cat-gut ligatures were absorbed by the body and if soaked in carbolic acid could be made sterile. He also attempted to maintain an antiseptic atmosphere in the operating theater by introducing a carbolic spray. This, however, made working conditions very unpleasant and the procedure was abandoned.

The Listerian system appears to have been accepted with little dissent and remarkable speed for by 1880 it had become the standard mode of surgical procedure virtually everywhere. Lister, an intensely shy and reserved man, achieved considerable fame and received many honors. In 1897 he became the first physician to be made a peer and sit in the House of Lords.

Joseph Lister (1827–1912) was an English surgeon. Educated at University College, London, he practiced and taught surgery in Scotland, first in Glasgow and then in Edinburgh, before returning to London in 1877. Lister was concerned about the frequently fatal wound infections that followed surgical operations, and, in search of solutions to this problem, he studied the work of European bacteriologists, notably that of Louis Pasteur. Lister thought that bacteria caused the postoperative infections that were so common, and although the connection between bacteria and infection had not been confirmed beyond doubt at that time, he understood that bacteria could be killed by antiseptics. He came up with the idea of using carbolic acid for this purpose and started the practice of preoperative cleansing of his and his assistants' hands with carbolic acid, as well as spraying carbolic acid liberally in the air in the operating room. The dramatic beneficial results of what amounted to an experimental trial of this regimen were reported in the Lancet in 1867. Lister's methods transformed the practice of surgery from a desperate, life-threatening gamble into a relatively safe procedure for many conditions—including the management of childbirth.

Unlike Ignaz Semmelweiss and Oliver Wendell Holmes, who preceded Lister in recognizing the importance of cleanliness in preventing infection during childbirth, Lister offered a method that did not imply that doctors were dirty, and so his message was heeded rather than rejected. Therefore he, more than Semmelweiss or Holmes, deserves much credit for making childbirth safe, as well as for the concept of antiseptic surgical operations. Lister was showered with honors, including elevation to the peerage, the first medical doctor to achieve this distinction. He was buried in Westminster Abbey with the pomp and ceremony reserved for the greatest national heroes.

(SEE ALSO: Antisepsis and Sterilization; Holmes, Oliver Wendell; Semmelweiss, Ignaz)

Bibliography

Lister, J. (1867). "On a New Method of Treating Compound Fractures, Abscesses, Etc., with Observations on the Conditions of Suppuration." Lancet 1:326–329, 357–359, 387–389, 507–509; 2:95–96.

—— (1867). "On the Antiseptic Principle in the Practice of Surgery." Lancet 2:353–356, 668–669.

— JOHN M. LAST

---

The English surgeon Joseph Lister, 1st Baron Lister of Lyme Regis (1827-1912), discovered the antiseptic technique, which represents the beginning of modern surgery.

Born in Upton, Essex, on April 5, 1827, Joseph Lister was the son of a wealthy wine merchant who developed an achromatic lens for the microscope. As a student Lister did microscopic research, and his acceptance of Louis Pasteur's work later may be related to his familiarity with the process of fermentation since childhood. After graduating from the University of London in 1852, Lister began a surgical career in Edinburgh; in 1860 he became professor of surgery at the Royal Infirmary in Glasgow.

With the introduction of anesthesia in the 1840s operations had become more frequent, but many patients died from infection following surgery. Inflammation and suppuration (pus formation) occurred in almost all accidental wounds and after surgery, and more so when patients were treated at the hospital rather than at home by a visiting surgeon. The reason was unknown, but it was believed to be something in the air. As a result, wounds were heavily dressed or irrigated with water to keep the air out; operations were a last resort. The body's cavities (head, chest, or abdomen) were practically never opened; injured limbs were usually amputated.

Lister's research centered on the microscopic changes in tissue that result in inflammation. When he read Pasteur's work on germs in 1864, Lister immediately applied Pasteur's thinking to the problem he was investigating. He concluded that inflammation was the result of germs entering and developing in the wound. Since Pasteur's sterilization by heat could not be applied to the living organism, Lister sought a chemical to destroy the germs.

That same year Lister read in the newspaper that the treatment of sewage with crude carbolic acid had led to a reduction of diseases among the people of Carlisle and among the cattle grazing on sewage-treated fields. In 1865 he developed a successful method of applying purified carbolic acid to wounds. The technique of spraying the air in the operating room with carbolic acid was only briefly used, as it was recognized that airborne germs were not of primary importance. Lister perfected the technical details of antisepsis and continued his research. He developed the surgical use of sterile catgut and silk and introduced gauze dressings. Antisepsis became a basic principle for the development of surgery; amputations became infrequent, as did death from infections; and new surgical procedures could be planned and safely executed.

In 1869 Lister returned to Edinburgh, and in 1877 he was appointed professor of surgery at King's College in London. He won worldwide acclaim and honors, including honorary doctorates, a baronetcy in 1882, and a peerage in 1897. After he retired in 1893 he became foreign secretary of the Royal Society and then its president from 1895 to 1900. He died at Walmer, Kent, on Feb. 10, 1912. Although Lister's antiseptic method was soon replaced by the use of asepsis, his work represented the first successful application of Pasteur's theory to surgery and marked the beginning of a new era.

Further Reading

The Collected Papers of Joseph Baron Lister (2 vols., 1909) contains an excellent description and evaluation of Lister's work. The official biography by Lister's nephew, Sir Rickman John Godlee, Lord Lister (1917; 2d ed. 1918), is detailed but dated. Frederick F. Cartwright's popularly written Joseph Lister: The Man Who Made Surgery Safe (1963) gives a well-balanced picture.

Lister, Joseph (1827-1912). Surgeon and pioneer of antisepsis. Having qualified at London, then teaching at Edinburgh, he was appointed (1860) as regius professor of clinical surgery at Glasgow, where he was one of the few to pursue the implications of Pasteur's recent work on fermentation and the beginnings of the germ theory. Recognition led to chairs at Edinburgh and London, the presidency of the Royal Society, and a barony (1897). His work improved public confidence in both hospitals and surgery, and stimulated the infant science of bacteriology.

Lister, Joseph Lister, 1st Baron, 1827-1912, English surgeon, educated at University College, London. He brought to surgery the principle of antisepsis, an outgrowth of Pasteur's theory that bacteria cause infection. In 1865, Lister proved the effectiveness of his methods, thus founding modern antiseptic surgery. Using carbolic acid as the antiseptic agent, he devised techniques of applying it that, when used in conjunction with his heat sterilization of instruments, brought about dramatic decreases in postoperative fatality. He developed absorbable ligatures and the drainage tube, both of which have come into general use for wounds and incisions. He was professor of clinical surgery at Edinburgh Univ. (1869-76) and at King's College, London (1877-93).

Bibliography

See biography by L. Farmer (1962); M. Goldman, Lister Ward (1987).

This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)