ANDREAS VESALIUS

ANDREAS VESALIUS
( 1514 - 1564)
Dr. Vesalius was a Flemish anatomist and physician. He was born into a family long associated with the medical care. He obtained his medical degree from the University of Padua. Then he worked there and teached surgery and anatomy. In 1559 he moved to Spain on an invitation to the Spanish court. He became physician at the court of Philip II. He had left Padua disgusted. He was condemned and people including his professor Jocobus Sylvius called him a madman who is poisoning Europe.

Vesalius’s surgical skills were extraordinary. He dissected. He dissected every sort of animal to improve his skill. He studied the anatomical structure of them. Once he wrote; “I could not even lay my hand upon a dried skull, much less take the chance of making a dissection. He overlooked every dissection he performed. He studied the bones perfectly.

After his enemy Sylirus died, Vesalius was invited back to Padua to take the chair of anatomy. But Vesalius decided to make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem and then go to Padua. On the return journey, in 1564, he was ship wrecked during violent storm, and died on a small island off the Greek coast. He was buried there only.

‘De human corporis fabrica’ is vesalins great work got published in 1543.