View source for Charles Pravaz

{{Short description|French orthopedic surgeon}}
[[File:Charles Pravaz.jpg|thumb|Pravaz, {{c.|1852}}]]
'''Charles Gabriel Pravaz''' (24 March 1791 – 24 June 1853) a [[France|French]] [[orthopedic]] [[surgeon]], pioneered the [[hypodermic]] [[syringe]]. 

While the concept dated to [[Galen]],<ref>[http://www.general-anaesthesia.com/people/charles-pravaz.html General Anaesthesia website]</ref> the modern syringe is thought{{by whom?|date=June 2021}} to have originated in 15th-century Italy, although it took several centuries for the device to develop. In 1657 the Englishmen [[Christopher Wren]] and [[Robert Boyle]] conducted experiments on syringe-like devices,<ref name="Discoveries in Medicine website">[http://www.discoveriesinmedicine.com/Ra-Thy/Syringe.html Discoveries in Medicine website]</ref> while about 1720 the French physician [[Dominique Anel]] developed the modern pump syringe as a device to clean wounds using suction.<ref name="Discoveries in Medicine website" /> 

Clinicians could not perform injections without an incision until [[Ireland |Irish]] physician [[Francis Rynd]] invented the hollow [[Hypodermic needle| needle]] in 1844. In 1853, wanting to inject iron perchloride [[Coagulation |coagulant]] into an [[aneurysm]], Pravaz adapted Rynd's needle,<ref>
{{cite book
 | last1 = Feldman
 | first1 = Philip S.
 | author-link1 = 
 | last2 = Covell
 | first2 = Jamie L
 | title = Fine Needle Aspiration Cytology and Its Clinical Applications: Breast & Lung
 | year = 1985
 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=0iFsAAAAMAAJ
 | location = Chicago
 | publisher = American Society of Clinical Pathologists Press
 | publication-date = 1985
 | page = 3
 | isbn = 9780891891840
 | access-date = 18 June 2021
 | quote = Pravaz, in 1853, developed a metallic syringe used originally for the treatment of aneurysms and vascular diseases and subsequently for subcutaneous injections.
}}
</ref>
rather than using the usual suction tube. Measuring 3&nbsp;cm (1.18 in) long and 5&nbsp;mm (0.2 in) in diameter, his syringe was entirely in silver,<ref name="Discoveries in Medicine website" />  made by ''[[Établissements Charrière]]'', and operated by a screw (rather than the plunger familiar today) to control the amount of substance injected.

The Scottish doctor [[Alexander Wood (physician)| Alexander Wood]] invented the syringe as used today - also in 1853. Wood's device, made of glass rather than silver, made it possible to see the amount and rate of flow of the fluid within it. It used a plunger rather than a screw mechanism to inject doses. As such it has barely changed since.

Pravaz died before he could publish an account of his invention, but another French surgeon, [[Jules Béhier |L. J. Béhier]], would make Pravaz's discovery known across Europe, thus initiating the science of [[sclerotherapy]] and the treatment of [[varicose veins]] and other [[varices]].

==Notes==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
*[http://www.general-anaesthesia.com/people/charles-pravaz.html General Anaesthesia website]
*[http://www.discoveriesinmedicine.com/Ra-Thy/Syringe.html Discoveries in Medicine website]

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[[Category:French surgeons]]
[[Category:1791 births]]
[[Category:1853 deaths]]

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