[Jean-Baptiste Vincent Laborde (1830-1903), forgotten neurologist and neurophysiologist]. / Le docteur Jean-Baptiste Vincent Laborde (1830-1903), neurologue et neurophysiologiste oublié.

Jean-Baptiste Vincent Laborde (1830-1903), native of Buzet, in Gascony, undertook his medical studies in Paris and was nominated "externe" (1854) then "interne" (1858) of Paris hospitals. His main "patrons" were Alfred Velpeau (1795-1867), Auguste Nélaton (1807-1873), Jean-Baptiste Bouillaud (1796-1881), Pierre-Olive Rayer (1793-1867), Joseph-François Malgaigne (1806-1865), Pierre Carl Edouard Potain (1825-1901), Ernest Charles Lasègue (1816-1883) and Léon Rostan (1790-1866). In 1864 he defended his thesis on the essential paralysis of childhood. He then worked in the physiology laboratory of Professor Jules Auguste Beclard (1818-1887), and became "chef des travaux" of physiology at the Paris faculty of medicine. In 1890, he was nominated to the chair of Biological anthropology at the Paris school of anthropology. His main works focused on the rhythmic tractions of the tongue in cases of apparent death, the understanding of the etiology of brain softening he attributed to vascular occlusions by atheroma and the discovery of connections between the cranial nuclei of common (III) and external (VI) oculomotor nerves and the struggle against the use of ceruse, against tuberculosis and especially against alcoholism. In addition, he made a career in journalism: since 1874 he had been the founder, director and editor-in-chief of the weekly newspaper The Medical Tribune, whose aim was to "combine to a fair extent, science and progress with the practice of medicine." Finally, Laborde was a convinced Republican, a friend of Léon Gambetta's (1838-1882). For him, democracy was the "ideal of civilized nations" and he showed deep hatred for the "Commune of Paris". Finally, he was a determined free thinker, who ran the Society for mutual autopsy for a while and who was attached to civil funerals and cremation.

Criticism of pithiatism: eulogy of Babinski.

Babinski, 'Chef de Clinique' of Charcot from 1885 to 1887, fully supported the ideas of his teacher on hysteria and thought that a dynamic brain cortical lesion is the cause of the disease. After Charcot's death in 1893, Babinski gradually revised his position. In a first step, he described many neurological signs in order to clearly distinguish hysterical manifestations from the organic disorders of the central nervous system. The most famous one bears his name, the Babinski sign, an inversion of the plantar cutaneous reflex, testifying to a lesion of the pyramidal tract. In a second step, he defined what remained of hysteria and proposed in 1901 to abandon the term 'hysteria' in favor of the neologism 'pithiatism', defined as a pathologic state resulting in disorders which can be very accurately reproduced by suggestion, and can disappear by persuasion. Babinski therefore retained the exclusive etiological role of suggestion and refuted, unlike Dejerine, the role of emotion. He also sought to separate pithiatism from simulation, but ambiguously he made pithiatics 'semi-malingerers'. During the Great War, with Froment, he described physiopathic disorders and separated them from pithiatic disorders and simulation. After being accepted by many French neurologists, pithiatism, the word as well as the concept, gently died out. There remained little more than a few philosophical uses (especially by Jean-Paul Sartre and Maurice Merleau-Ponty) or metaphorical ones. What remains of the work of Babinski in the field of hysteria is not so much the creation of pithiatism as the masterly description of neurological signs to formally exclude an organic lesion of the nervous system or simulation before looking like hysteria disorders.

[James Parkinson (1755-1824) revisited]. / James Parkinson (1755-1824) revisité.

The name of Parkinson is universally famous because of the eponymous disease. But as a man, James Parkinson (1755-1824), is poorly known. He was born, married and passed away in his St-Leonard parish in Shoreditch (London). After having studied Latin, Greek, natural philosophy, and stenography (shorthand), which he considered as the basic tools of any doctor, he studied for six months at the London Hospital Medical College, and served his apprenticeship as an apothecary-surgeon with his father for six years. Then he was qualified as a surgeon in 1784 at the age of 29 years. His activity has been deployed in three areas: 1) medicine, 2) political activism and social reformism, 3) paleontology and oryctology. As a physician, Parkinson has published several books, the most important concerned paralysis agitans (future Parkinson's disease), gout, complications of lightning (future Lichtenberg figures and keraunoparalysis), acute appendicitis (with his son John Parkinson) and hernias (diagnosis, development, dangers of hernia ruptures, and design of a simple truss). Its ideological and political commitment was manifested by joining two secret societies and publishing numerous pamphlets, many of which are signed by the pseudonym Old Hubert; he campaigned for a better representation of the people in Parliament, for greater social justice, for the defense and recognition of the rights of the poor, the insane, the children, and against children abuse. He published a small compendium of chemistry, he was one of the thirteen members who create the British Geological Society and is recognized as one of the founders of paleontology; as was Georges Cuvier (1769-1832), he remained a strong supporter of creationism and catastrophism. Distinguished oryctologist, he gave his name to several fossils, mainly molluscs.

Theater in professor Charcot's galaxy.

Jean-Martin Charcot, famous professor of the Chair of Clinic for Diseases of the Nervous System at Salpêtrière Hospital in Paris, was himself an artist, surrounded by artists, and adored the theater. His close colleague Charles Brown-Séquard was ridiculed by Georges Feydeau in a brief freakish monologue recited by Coquelin Cadet, from the Comédie-Française, concerning his claims to rejuvenate himself and others with animal testicle extracts. His friend and patient Alphonse Daudet had written many novels, short stories, and plays. Léon Daudet, Alphonse Daudet's son (and friend of Jean-Baptiste Charcot, the son of the professor), after having abandoned his medical studies, became a writer whose novel Les morticoles was a cruel satire of the medical profession. Among Charcot's pupils, Alfred Binet, Gilbert Ballet, Édouard Brissaud, and Joseph Babinski were particularly involved in the theater. Gilbert Ballet wrote the foreword to La folie au théâtre (Madness in Theatre) by André de Latour. Édouard Brissaud wrote a satiric play Le chèque (The Check), and Joseph Babinski, under the pseudonym of Olaf, was the coauthor with Palau of the drama Les détraquées (The Deranged Women). However, when all is said and done, perhaps the greatest actor in his entourage was Charcot himself.

[Smallpox at the Hotel Dieu of Paris in 1900. An unpublished letter of Professor Brissaud]. / La variole a l'Hôtel-Dieu de Paris en 1900 une lettre inédite adressée au professeur Brissaud.

On November 26, 1900, René Monod, resident in Professor E douard Brissaud's department, wrote at Brissaud's request a report on the cases of smallpox which had happened in his department at the Hôtel-Dieu since September. This unpublished document attests to Brissaud's interest in hygienism, Pasteurism and Jennerian vaccination.

Birth and death of Charcot's scientific journals.

In this chapter, we present an analytical and critical inventory of Charcot's scientific journals. This was undertaken by searching the files at Charcot's library at the Salpêtrière, the Bibliothèque Nationale de France and a review of literature. One can distinguish four kinds of Charcot's scientific journals. (1) The journals co-founded by Charcot: the Archives de physiologie normale et pathologique founded in 1868, by Brown-Séquard, Charcot and Vulpian with Joffroy as vice-director; the Revue de médecine whose founders in 1881 were Bouchard, Charcot and Vulpian and the editors Landouzy and Raphaël Lépine; the Revuede l'hypnotisme expérimental et thérapeutique founded in 1887 by Charcot among others, with Bérillon as editor. (2) The journals founded under the direction of Charcot: the Iconographie photographique de la Salpêtrière, founded in 1877 by Bourneville and Regnard; the Archives de Neurologie, Revue des maladies nerveuses et mentales founded by Bourneville in 1880; the Archives de médecine expérimentale et d'anatomie pathologique founded in 1889 by Grancher, Lépine, Straus and Joffroy; the Nouvelle Iconographie de la Salpêtrière, in 1888 by Richer, Gilles de la Tourette and Londe. (3) The journals founded by Charcot's followers with his blessing: Le Progrès médical by Bourneville in 1873 and the Revue neurologique by Brissaud and Pierre Marie in 1893. (4) Another journal founded by Charcot's followers: the Archives slaves de neurologie by Mendelssohn and Richet. In conclusion, Charcot was neither a journalist nor a true editor, but he appreciated his name being well-placed on the cover of the reviews founded by his followers.

[Edouard Brissaud, a neglected neurologist and an artist at heart]. / Edouard Brissaud, neurologue méconnu et comédien dans l'ame.

Academy of Medicine, was a distinguished neurologist. He founded the journal Revue Neurologique, and authored a monumental atlas of the human brain and a talented history of popular medical expressions. He was surrounded by a family of artists, musicians and, above all, actors and singers. The best-known were his great-grandfather Jacques-Marie Boutet de Monvel, nicknamed "The Great Monvel ", his great aunt Mademoiselle Mars, and his cousin Marie Dorval--monstres sacrés of the first half of the XIXth century--as well as the Anselme-Baptiste family and the three Nourrit tenors. As a child, Edouard Brissaud frequently took part in family plays. He was spontaneous, facetious, a practical joker and something of a show-off. He wrote a comedy play entitled "Le chèque", in which a medical professor and his student discuss the temporary direction Chair of Nervous System Diseases that Brissaud briefly held between 1893 and 1894, after the death of his mentor Charcot.

[Edouard Brissaud (1852-1909), historian of medicine]. / Edouard Brissaud (1852-1909), historien de la medecine.

Among The Brissauds, teaching history was a family job. Edouard's father was a history teacher at the Lycee Charlemagne in Paris and his mother taught history in her own private school. Several uncles and cousins wrote history books. Edouard Brissaud, beloved Charcot's disciple, médecin des hôpitaux and agrégé, wrote some short historical papers, for instance The King's disease, Charles of Guyenne's death, Scarron's disease, Théophile de Bordeu's eulogy, Couthon's infirmity. Two full papers deal with controversial contemporary problems: vivisection and microbial theory. His Histoire des expressions populaires relatives à l'anatomie, à la physiologie et à la médecine, published in 1888, is a true small masterpiece which was appreciated by Anatole France. In 1899, Edouard Brissaud, succeeded Joseph Laboulbène (1825-1889) in the Chair of History of medicine at the Paris medical school. He was extensively congratulated for his inaugural lecture. One year later, like many of his colleagues, he left this Chair for that of Medical Pathology.

[Edouard Brissaud (1852-1909), Charcot's favorite pupil]. / Edouard Brissaud (1852-1909), élève préféré de Charcot.

Edouard Brissaud's career and scientific work are deeply marked by the influence of professor Jean-Martin Charcot, Head of the Chair of clinics of nervous system diseases at the Salpêtrière. Brissaud was his "externe" in 1875 and his "interne" in 1879. In 1880, his medical thesis was presided over by Charcot, who also served as a jury member for his "agrégation" in 1886. Brissaud was the king pin and the cornerstone of the famous medical handbook (Traité de médecine), which was kindly supported by Charcot and Bouchard. In 1893, a few months before Charcot's death, Brissaud, encouraged by Charcot, founded the Revue neurologique with Pierre Marie. When, after Charcot's death, Brissaud, in charge of the interim of the Salpêtrière's Chair, paid a glowing tribute to him, in his first lecture. Charcot thought highly of Brissaud and was fond of him. Two unpublished letters from Charcot to Brissaud gave evidence of his attachment to him. In one of these letters, Charcot friendly discussed the medical handbook with Brissaud and left his son Jean-Baptiste Charcot, as an "interne", in the care of Brissaud. In the other letter, Charcot gave Brissaud an original observation of alcoholic paralysis and asked him what he thought of it. On the whole, as pertinently written by late professor Jean-Louis Signoret, "Edouard Brissaud was undoubtedly Charcot's favourite disciple".

[Joseph Babinski: a complex personality]. / Joseph Babinski: une personnalité complexe.

Joseph Babinski (1857-1932), a Paris hospital neurologist known for the discovery of his eponymous sign, was a highly complex personality. He was known as a handsome but silent "blue-eyed giant". His parents left Poland for Paris after the insurrection of 1848. Joseph and his elder brother Henri (1855-1931) were born in Paris and were therefore French, but they remained devoted to Poland. Joseph suffered from excruciating self-doubt and was meticulous. He was a reasoner and a righter of wrongs. Henri, who trained as a civil engineer at the French National School of Mines, prospected mineral, gold and diamond deposits in various countries. On his return to France at the end of the century, he wrote, under the pseudonym Ali-Bab, a monumental cookbook called "Gastronomie pratique", which was widely acclaimed Joseph and Henri, both unmarried, lived together and formed an inseparable couple. Joseph Babinski had no religious, political or ideological commitments. Some areas of his private life still remain rather shadowy.

[Intramedullary lipomatous ependymoma: case report]. / Ependymome lipomateux intramédullaire.

A 51 year-old man was admitted to our hospital with poor general health and neurological disturbances with paresthesia, dysuria and defecation disorder. Neuroimaging showed a syringomyelia cyst from C1 to conus medullaris, together with a intramedullar tumoral mass in T6-T7. Histological examination of the surgical specimen led to the diagnosis of lipomatous ependymoma.

Intra-cerebral schwannoma simulating glioma.

An intra-cerebral schwannoma, presenting as a cystic, calcified, enhancing frontal mass, arising in a 52-year-old woman was misdiagnosed as a glioma and treated with radiotherapy. This observation emphasizes the importance of careful histological reexamination of all brain tumors when a discrepancy appears between the initial histological diagnosis and the clinical evolution, in order to recognize rare curable entities and to avoid potentially toxic treatment.

The Charcot library.

The Charcot library was officially created at the Salpêtrière Hospital in 1907 after the donation of the private library of Jean-Martin Charcot, which Dr. Charcot had accumulated progressively throughout his professional career. Increased by several other endowments (the most important being the collection of the Resident's Library, begun in 1886) and other private donations, the library became officially affiliated with the Paris VI University in 1985. It now functions as an entity oriented toward the neurosciences and offers a large number of 19th-century books (including all of Charcot's manuscripts) and more recent documents. Digitization of the most classic holdings, including atlases, will soon make them accessible through the library's web site.