Harry Goldblatt

Harry Goldblatt (born March 14, 1891 in Muscatine , Iowa , † January 6, 1977 in Cleveland ) was an American pathologist .

family

He was the son of Philip Goldblatt and Jennie Spitz, destitute Jewish immigrants from Lithuania who had come to the United States in 1886. Since the father did not speak the English language, he could hardly raise his living there and finally left the small town to move first to Omaha , then to Chicago and finally in 1896 to Montréal , Canada . Goldblatt grew up here, and his father was able to support his training, who meanwhile ran a business in coal, wood and ice.

In 1929 Goldblatt married Jeanne Elizabeth Rea, with whom he had two sons who later both worked as doctors.

education and profession

After graduating from primary school in 1904, Goldblatt attended high school in Montréal. Here, in particular, his mathematical and scientific talent was evident, which in 1908 brought him a scholarship to McGill University . In his first year of university he first studied at the Arts College, but then took a course in botany with Carrie M. Derrick, under whose influence and guidance he developed a great interest in biology and in 1912 won the Hiram Mills Gold Medal for Biology (BA) . He also graduated with honors in 1916 from his medical degree (MD, CM), which he finished within four years due to his talent. Goldblatt then worked as an assistant in the major surgical and pathological departments of the Royal Victoria Hospital in Montréal.

After joining the US Army in 1917 and a short period of preparation in orthopedics at Harvard University , Goldblatt was sent to France and made head of the orthopedics and fractures department of Evacuation Hospital No. 26; He then looked after Evacuation Hospital No. 3 in Trier in the same function until the end of the war .

After returning to the USA, Goldblatt worked for a short time as a neurosurgeon under Harvey Williams Cushing (1869–1939) at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital, but then decided to pursue further training in pathology and took on a position as pathologist and assistant to Howard T. Karsner, Professor at Case Western Reserve University , Lakeside Hospital in Cleveland / Ohio (1919–1921). During this time, Goldblatt not only made a final decision in favor of general pathology, but also developed an increased interest in experimental pathology. In order to further his education, Goldblatt decided to go to England for two years to work as a volunteer in London at the Lister Institute for Preventive Medicine .

In May 1924 Goldblatt returned to Cleveland, where he was offered an assistant professorship at the School of Medicine at Western Reserve University and the license to teach pathology (1924-1927). In Cleveland Goldblatt represented the pathology subject in several functions: associated professor (1927-1935), associated director of the Institute of Pathology (1929-1946), professor of experimental pathology (1935-1946). He headed the institute for medical research at Cedars of Lebanon Hospital in Los Angeles , California (1946-1953), worked again as an experimental pathologist until his retirement in 1961 in Cleveland and was most recently (until 1976) director of the LD Memorial Research Laboratories on Mount Sinai Hospital.

power

Goldblatt became world-famous for his experimental research in the field of high blood pressure . In 1934 the first report appeared with results on the artificial generation of persistent high blood pressure in dogs through unilateral and bilateral constriction of the renal arteries: He invented a special clamp that allowed the investigation of the circulatory effects of a graduated vasoconstriction in non-anesthetized animals. On the one hand, this led to the first description of the secondary renovascular hypertension ; on the other hand, this work stimulated international hypertension research, which contributed to the elucidation of the RAAS ( renin - angiotensin - aldosterone system). From 1934 to 1943, 21 papers appeared on this topic, for example a process for the purification and production of renin (1943). In 1948 Goldblatt published a comprehensive monograph The Renal Origin of Hypertension . However, the priority of the discovery of renovascular hypertension has been discussed since 2006: Almost at the same time (1933) the Austro-Hungarian pathologist Johann Lösch (* 1897) came to comparable results, which, however, were largely ignored by the scientific community.

In more than 127 scientific publications he dealt with gastrointestinal polyposis (1916), described a case of coarctation of the aortic isthmus (1922), examined the connection between light exposure and vitamin D (1923), experimented with rickets in rats (1924) , described ischemic vascular reactions (1926), investigated experimentally produced peritonitis (1927) and described the prevention and cure of rickets in rats as well as the antirachitic effect of sterols in UV radiation (1932). Goldblatt was probably the first to point out the photosynthetic properties of vitamin D when exposed to UV radiation. In addition, he was very interested in research into cancer development (1930–1974).

Goldblatt believed at the beginning of his animal-experimental high-pressure studies to have found an explanation of the pathomechanism of nephrosclerosis or essential hypertension. It later turned out, however, that the results of the animal experiment could not easily be transferred to the pathogenesis of human high blood pressure. The pathomechanism discovered by Goldblatt was of importance for the differential diagnosis of human hypertension only for a relatively small group of hypertension (about 1% of all forms of hypertension) of secondary hypertension .

When Goldblatt syndrome (in humans) is mentioned, renovascular hypertension is meant within the group of renal hypertension.

The term Goldblatt effect refers to the occurrence of persistent high blood pressure after unilateral or bilateral renal artery stenosis in humans or animal renal artery throttling.

Goldblatt was a member of more than 12 American (including the National Academy of Sciences 1973) and English professional societies and received 15 scientific awards and prizes, including the Amory Prize of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1961). He has been nominated for the Nobel Prize several times .

Works

• Rickets, a review from the experimental standpoint . In: Ergeb General Pathol , 25 (1931) 58
• Studies on experimental hypertension. I. The Production of Persistent Elevation of Systolic Blood Pressure by Means of Renal Ischemia (with Lynch J., Hanzal RF, Summerville WW). In: J Exp Med , 59 (1934) 347
• Prevention and cure of rickets in rats and antirachitic activation of ergosterol by cold quartz mercury lamp . In: Proc Soc Exp Biol Med , 30 (1932) 380
• The Clinical Pathologist as an Experimenter . In: Am J Clin Pathol , 13 (1943) 329
• On the Purification of Renin . In: J Exp Med , 78 (1943) 67
• The Renal Origin of Hypertension . Springfield (Ill.) 1948
• Hypertension due to renal ischemia . In: Bull NY Acad Med , 40 (1964) 745

literature

• Harry Goldblatt: Reflections. Urol Clin North Am 2 (1975) 219
• LB Berman: Harry Goldblatt: 1891–1977. JAMA 238 (1977) 1846
• Solomon Robert Kagan: American Jewish Physicians of Note. Boston 1942, p. 144
• E. Haas: Reminiscenses and reflections. J Hypertension 4 Suppl (1986) S21
• J. Laragh: Harry Goldblatt, 1891-1977. Trans Assoc Am Physicians 91 (1978) 34
• Harold N. Segall: Pioneers of Cardiology in Canada. Willowdale (Ontario) 1988. p. 59
• The renal origin of hypertension: progress over 50 years. A symposium commemorating the 50th anniversary of the experimental production of renal hypertension by Harry Goldblatt, MD, October 1984, Toledo, Ohio, USA. J Hypertension 4 Suppl (1986) S1
• B. Glodny, DE Glodny: John Loesch, Discoverer of Renovascular Hypertension, and Harry Goldblatt: Two Great Pioneers in Circulation Research. Ann Int Med 144 (2006) 286-295
• D. Goldblatt, PJ Goldblatt: John Loesch and Harry Goldblatt: Two Great Pioneers in Circulation Research. Ann Intern Med 145 (2006) 933

Web links

• The discovery of renin (English)
• Harry Goldblatt and Johann Lösch, priority of the discovery of renovascular hypertension