Charles
McBurney, M.D.
Name: Charles
McBurney
Death date: Nov 7, 1913
Place of death: Stockbridge, MA
Type of practice: Allopath
Journal of the American Medical Association Citation:
61:1826 |
In the history of
medicine, Charles McBurney's name will ever be associated with the
vermiform appendix as the first surgeon to point out a ready means of
detecting a diseased appendix by pressure on a particular spot. Charles
McBurney (1845-1913) was professor of surgery at the College of
Physicians and Surgeons and worked mainly at Roosevelt Hospital in New
York. In 1889, he described the point of maximal abdominal tenderness (McBurney's
point) to be determined by the pressure of one finger placed one-third
of the distance between the anterior iliac spine and the umbilicus.
McBurney pioneered early diagnosis and early operative intervention and
in 1894 he described the muscle-splitting incision that today bears his
name. The incision in the skin is oblique and about 4-inches long. It
crosses a line drawn from the anterior iliac spine and is situated such
that its upper third lies above that line.
Charles McBurney was born
in Roxbury, Massachusetts on February 17, 1845. He was the son of
Charles and Rosine Horton McBurney. He was educated in private schools
in and about Boston and entered Harvard University in 1862, receiving
the degree of A.B. in 1866, and A.M. in 1869.
He earned his M.D. at the
College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York City in 1870, interned at
Bellevue Hospital in 1871, and went abroad to continue his medical
studies in Vienna, Paris, and London. He began his practice upon his
return to New York City.
In 1872, McBurney was
appointed assistant demonstrator of anatomy in the College of Physicians
and Surgeons and filled this position until 1880, when he was elected
instructor in operative surgery. From 1889 to 1892, he was professor of
surgery; from 1892 to 1897, he was professor of clinical surgery, and
later professor emeritus. He continued to attend to private and hospital
practice until 1907 when he retired to Stockbridge, Massachusetts. He
was visiting surgeon to St. Luke's Hospital from 1875 to 1888, and was
the only attending surgeon to Roosevelt Hospital from 1889 to 1901.
Through the gift of
William J. Syms, in 1892 McBurney established the first model elaborate
private operating pavilion, The Syms Operating Pavilion. This surgical
facility, opened in 1892, achieved national and worldwide prominence for
its surgical teaching and research. It was here that he introduced the
practice of having the entire surgical team wear rubber gloves, shortly
after Halsted had recommended this practice at Johns Hopkins.
He was also consulting
surgeon to the New York, Presbyterian, St. Mary's, and Orthopedic
Hospitals, and to the Hospital for the Ruptured and Crippled. He was an
honorary member of the Royal College of Surgeons, the College of
Physicians and Surgeons in Philadelphia, the Surgical Society, and other
medical organizations.
Among his contributions
to surgery are The Indications for Early Laparotomy, The Treatment
of Appendicitis, A Contribution to Cerebral Surgery, and
Dislocation of the Humerus Complicated by Fracture. He was a
contributor to Dennis' System of Surgery and to The
International TextBook of Surgery.
Charles McBurney married
Margaret Willoughby Weston on October 8, 1874. They had two sons and a
daughter. Mrs. McBurney died on June 1, 1909, Brookline, Massachusetts on November 7, 1913 at age
68. His legacy to surgery of the biliary tract was not awarded the
recognition that his contributions in appendicitis received, but his
early advocacy of sphincterotomy for common duct stone is worthy of
remembrance. He reported six successful cases of removal of biliary
calculi from the common duct by the duodenal route in 1898. This novel
approach anticipated by at least half a century the operation
sphincterotomy for common duct stones, now a mainstay of endoscopy
practice.
