Forlanini, Carlo

SUBJECT AREA: Medical technology

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b. 11 June 1847 Milan, Italy

d. 26 May 1918 Nervi, Italy

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Italian physician who originated the technique of therapeutic pneumothorax.

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After a medical education at Turin, where he qualified in 1870, he held assistant posts before becoming chief of the medical clinic by 1880. He later moved to Pavia as Professor of Medicine and soon became engaged in the development of his procedure for inducing artificial pneumothorax in the treatment of tuberculosis.

He treated his first case using this technique in 1882, and by 1894 he was able to report a series of forty-five cases in which a cure had been facilitated. The treatment soon gained wide acceptance and remained an important element of the anti-tubercular armamentarium until the development of chemotherapeutic drugs effective for this purpose.

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Bibliography

1882, "Contribuzione della terapia chirurgica della tisi. Ablazione der pulmone? Pneumothorace artificiale", Gazy. Osp. Clin.

1894, "Primo caso did tisi pulmonale arangata curato feliciamente col pneumothorace artificiale", Gazy. med. di Torino.

Further Reading

Riviere, 1917, The Pneumothorax Treatment of Pulmonary Tuberculosis, London.

MG