The Doctor Who Discovered that Handwashing Saves Lives
A 19th Century physician was ridiculed for telling his colleagues to wash their hands
In the 1840’s a Hungarian physician made a momentous discovery that caused conflict and division in the medical community.
Dr Ignaz Semmelweis was working as an obstetrician/gynaecologist in a large teaching hospital in Austria when he became aware of a startling contrast between rates of puerperal fever (childbed fever) in new mothers in different clinics of the same hospital.
Although most women gave birth at home in 19th Century Europe, a small percentage of expectant mothers were admitted to hospital. One of the maternity clinics in this particular hospital was staffed by midwives and midwifery students while the other was staffed primarily by male doctors and medical students.
The rates of puerperal fever were three to five times higher in the clinic run by doctors. Semmelweis launched an investigation examining the differences in practices between the two clinics but was unable to identify the causative factor.
It was not until the death of one of his colleagues that he was enlightened. The doctor, a pathologist, had pricked his finger while performing an autopsy on a woman who had died of puerperal fever and had himself become ill with identical symptoms. Semmelweis then discovered that other pathologists had previously died from the same disease. An affliction that was thought to affect only new mothers was also killing male doctors.
It was then that Semmelweis realised that there was one significant difference between the two clinics; the midwives worked solely in the clinic whereas the medical students delivered babies as well as assisting with autopsies in the morgue.
Medical students and doctors were dissecting dead bodies in the morgue and then going directly to the clinic to deliver babies. It became clear to Semmelweis that the doctors were transferring something from the corpses to the women in labour.
Despite protests from his superiors, Semmelweis instigated a strict regime of handwashing among his students, instructing them to clean their hands with chlorine solution following autopsies. The rates of fever dropped dramatically.
He then went a step further and ordered them to clean the surgical instruments too. The infection rates dropped even further to almost zero per cent.
Rather than crediting Semmelweis for this profound discovery, his colleagues and superiors found his results disconcerting. They felt insulted by his insinuation that they were dirty and for implying that they were responsible for their own patients’ deaths.
Although his own students recognised the effectiveness of the new hygiene procedures they were overruled by senior staff. Semmelweis was forced to leave his job, and the handwashing and cleaning of instruments in the hospital ceased.
His career, reputation and health were severely affected and never recovered. His mental state slowly deteriorated and he was eventually admitted to an asylum. Ironically, his death, two weeks after his admission, was from a wound infection.
Tragically Semmelweis did not live long enough to learn about further discoveries in the field of bacteriology by trailblazers such as Louis Pasteur and Joseph Lister.
In recognition of his work, a university was named after him. Semmelweis University is located in Budapest in Hungary, the country of his birth.
