Portuguese physician and scientist
Bernardino Antonio Gomes
CavTE
ComC
ComSE
(22 September 1806 ? 8 April 1877)
[1]
was a Portuguese physician and scientist. He is perhaps most widely remembered for his pioneering work in Portugal in the field of
anaesthesiology
, as the first physician in the country to use
chloroform
in a surgical procedure (on 12 January 1848, during a knee tumorectomy); he is also credited with the popularization of the use of
creosote
and of the first
ether
inhalers.
[2]
Biography
[
edit
]
Bernardino Antonio Gomes was the son of noted physician, pioneering
dermatologist
, chemist, and botanist of name,
Bernardino Antonio Gomes Sr.
(1768?1823), and his wife Leonor Violante Rosa Mourao (1775?1864).
[3]
He was baptised on 9 October 1806, in the parish of
Santa Engracia
,
Lisbon
.
[3]
He first studied
Mathematics
in the
University of Coimbra
, switching to
Medicine
after obtaining the first degree. He interrupted his studies in 1828, with the start of the
Portuguese Civil War
; he joined the
Academic Battalion
but soon after, judging, like many did, the
Liberal
cause lost when
King Miguel I
seized the throne, he departed to
Paris
, where he completed his medical studies in 1831.
[1]
At the invitation of the
Marquis of Palmela
, who was part of the Liberal
government-in-opposition
, Bernardino Antonio Gomes rejoined the Liberal forces in
Terceira Island
in the
Azores
: he would later take part in the
Landing at Mindelo
, the turning point of the Civil War, and was in the besieged resistance at the
Siege of Porto
(during which he provided medical assistance due to a
cholera
outbreak).
[1]
As the
Constitutional Monarchy
was finally established, he filled the positions of Director of the
Royal Naval Hospital
, Chairman of the Council for Naval Health, physician of
Saint Joseph's Hospital
, and Professor at the Lisbon Medical-Surgical School (Chair of
Materia Medica
from 1837 to 1857).
[1]
Bernardino Antonio Gomes distinguished himself during the
yellow fever
and
cholera
epidemics that ravaged the country in the 1850s. He was sent as a national delegate to the third of the
International Sanitary Conferences
(in
Constantinople
, 1866); in opposition to
Pettenkofer
's
anti-contagionism
that dominated the scientific thinking of the conference, Bernardino Antonio Gomes was a staunch defender of the
theory of contagion
and considered it advisable to ban all maritime communication to quell the
ongoing cholera pandemic
that had begun in the
Ganges Delta
, "to combat the scourge in the very countries in which it is born or, at least, to halt its progress as near as possible to its original home" (measures that were opposed, notably, by the delegates from the
United Kingdom
).
[4]
[5]
In 1858, Bernardino Antonio Gomes became embroiled in a heated
pamphlet war
with the
Duke of Saldanha
, one of the leading promoters of
homeopathy
and other systems of
alternative medicine
like
mesmerism
or the "
Raspail method
" in the country. The tone of the replies quickly escalated, with Bernardino Antonio Gomes protesting that the Duke was hardly an authority when he clearly had so little baggage and was armed with such lacking medical literature ? something, he wrote, that did not stop him from openly casting doubt on science and making the public mistrustful of medical practitioners.
[6]
He was appointed
First Physician of the Royal Chamber
in 1864, by
King Luis I
, following the death of
Francisco Elias Rodrigues da Silveira, 1st Baron of Silveira
; Gomes refused the title of Baron that was customarily bestowed upon those filling that position at court.
[2]
Previously, he had already been a personal physician to his brother and predecessor
King Peter V
? Bernardino Antonio Gomes was responsible for conducting and publicising the results of the King's autopsy in 1861, when tensions were running high as three deaths in quick succession within the Royal Family (the King,
Infante John, Duke of Beja
and
Infante Ferdinand
) had made the public suspicious of foul play and threaten to mutiny; he attributed the deaths to
typhoid fever
.
[7]
On two different occasions, in 1843?4 and 1864?6, Bernardino Antonio Gomes served as President of the
Lisbon Society of Medical Sciences
.
[8]
As a
natural historian
, Bernardino Antonio Gomes published an exhaustive review of the
fossil flora
of the
Carboniferous
systems
in Portugal (1865), and was a contributor in the
Catalogus Plantarum Horti Botanici Medico-Cirurgicae Scholae Olisiponensis
(1851).
[8]
He also oversaw the committee in charge of creating the 1876
Portuguese
Pharmacopoeia
, the first time the country's official pharmaceutical reference work was drawn up by a committee of select physicians and chemists.
[9]
He married Maria Leocadia Fernandes Tavares de Barros (1818?1854) in the parish of
Encarnacao
,
Lisbon
, on 14 October 1837.
[10]
They were the parents of botanist, forestry engineer, and
Lazarite
priest
Bernardino Antonio de Barros Gomes
(1839?1910), and statesman
Henrique de Barros Gomes
(1843?1898).
Distinctions
[
edit
]
National orders
[
edit
]
Foreign orders
[
edit
]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
a
b
c
d
e
f
Pereira e Sousa, F. (1890).
"Dr. Bernardino Antonio Gomes"
.
A Imprensa
(in Portuguese). No. 65. Lisbon. pp. 132?134
. Retrieved
18 October
2020
.
- ^
a
b
c
d
e
f
Lopes, Alfredo Luiz (1890).
O Hospital de Todos os Santos hoje denominado de S. Jose: Contribuicoes para a Historia das Sciencias Medicas em Portugal
[
All Saints' Hospital, today called of Saint Joseph: Contributions for the History of Medical Sciences in Portugal
] (in Portuguese). Lisboa: Imprensa Nacional. pp. 72?74.
- ^
a
b
Livro de Registo de Baptismos 1806/1818 (fl. 19 v.), Paroquia de Santa Engracia, Lisboa
?
Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo
- ^
Howard-Jones, Norman (1975).
"The scientific background of the International Sanitary Conferences (1851?1938)"
.
History of International Public Health
.
1
.
hdl
:
10665/62873
. Retrieved
18 October
2020
.
- ^
Garnel, Maria Rita Lino (2009).
"Portugal e as Conferencias Sanitarias Internacionais (em torno das epidemias oitocentistas de
cholera-morbus
)"
[Portugal and the International Sanitary Conferences (concerning the 19th-century epidemics of
cholera-morbus
)].
Revista de Historia da Sociedade e da Cultura
(in Portuguese).
9
: 229?251.
doi
:
10.14195/1645-2259_9_9
.
ISSN
1645-2259
. Retrieved
18 October
2020
.
- ^
Pombo, Maria Dulce (2010).
Modelos terapeuticos em movimento no Portugal do seculo XIX: actores, discursos e controversias
[
Therapeutic models in motion in 19th-century Portugal: players, discourses, and controversies
] (Master's degree). ISCTE ? Instituto Universitario de Lisboa, Escola de Sociologia e Politicas Publicas.
hdl
:
10071/3836
. Retrieved
18 October
2020
.
- ^
Almeida, Maria Antonia Pires de (2014). "Combatendo epidemias: Bernardino Antonio Gomes, Sousa Martins, Ricardo Jorge, Camara Pestana, Almeida Garrett, Fernando da Silva Correia". In Rollo, Maria Fernanda; Nunes, Maria de Fatima; Esperanca Pina, Madalena; Queiroz, Maria Ines (eds.).
Espacos e Actores da Ciencia em Portugal (XVIII-XX)
(in Portuguese). Lisboa: Caleidoscopio. pp. 309?326.
hdl
:
10071/12242
.
ISBN
9789896582746
.
- ^
a
b
"Bernardino Gomes (1843/1844 e 1864/1866)"
(in Portuguese). Sociedade das Ciencias Medicas de Lisboa
. Retrieved
17 October
2020
.
- ^
Conceicao, J.; Pita, J.R.; Estanqueiro, M.; Lobo, J.S. (2009).
"As farmacopeias portuguesas e a saude publica"
[Portuguese pharmacopoeias and public health]
(PDF)
.
Acta Farmaceutica Portuguesa
(in Portuguese).
3
(1): 47?65.
ISSN
2182-3340
. Retrieved
18 October
2020
.
- ^
Livro de Registo de Casamentos 1834/1848 (fl. 137), Paroquia da Encarnacao, Lisboa
?
Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo
- ^
International Plant Names Index
.
B.A.Gomes
.
External links
[
edit
]
|
---|
International
| |
---|
National
| |
---|
Academics
| |
---|
Other
| |
---|