Maurice Raynaud

A. G. Maurice Raynaud (1834–1881), is the French doctor who discovered Raynaud's Disease, a rare vasopastic disorder which contracts blood vessels in extremities and is the "R" in the CREST syndrome acronym, in the late 19th century.

Life and career

Maurice Raynaud was the son of a university professor. He commenced his medical studies at the University of Paris with the help of his uncle, the well known Paris physician Ange-Gabriel-Maxime Vernois (1809-1877), and obtained his medical doctorate in 1862. He thus became one of the select few who have achieved eponymous fame with their doctoral dissertation. He became Dr. des lettres with the article "Asclepiades of Bathynia, doctor and philosopher", and the book "Medicine in Molière’s time".

Raynaud never received a senior position at any of the Paris hospitals, but became Médecine des hôpitaux in 1865. At various occasions he was attached to the hospitals Hôtel Dieu, Laboisière, and Charité. In 1866 he became agrégé at the faculty with the works Sur les hyperhémies non phlegmasiques and De la revulsion.

He was made an officer of the Légion d’honneur in 1871 and elected to the Académie de médecine in 1879, and lectured with great success at the university as well as the Hôpital Lariboisière and the Charité.

Raynaud always wanted to hold a chair of medical history in Paris,, but died on June 29, 1881, in his prime, shortly before the international medical congress in London that year. At the time he had been suffering for several years from cardiac disease. His address, Scepticism in Medicine, Past and Present, was read by one of his colleagues.

Raynaud was an excellent teacher and fine clinician. He was also a busy writer. His book Sur la salive d'un enfant mort de la rage was the result of research done with Louis Pasteur (1822-1895) and Odilon Marc Lannelongue (1840-1911).

External links

• Raynaud's disease and Raynaud's phenomenon named after A. G. Maurice Raynaud at Who Named It?

Persondata
Name	Raynaud, Maurice
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Date of birth	1834
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Date of death	1881
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