Karl Hansen (medic)
Karl Hansen (born May 7, 1893 in Trier , † October 20, 1962 in Neckargemünd ) was a German internist , allergist and neurologist .
Training and first research activity in Heidelberg
The years of apprenticeship with internist Ludolf von Krehl in Heidelberg , who placed the patient as a personality and not the organ-limited disease process, were the main focus of medical thought. This led Hansen, who completed his habilitation in Heidelberg in 1923 and was appointed associate professor there in 1927, also to research psychophysical interactions, for example in the suggestive influence of physiological regulation of gastric and pancreatic secretion, which gave rise to completely new views on the formation of symptoms in neurosis and showed their psychotherapeutic influenceability. When the experiment suggested by Krehl to "hypnotize" the antibodies away from allergies failed and the antigen-antibody reaction remained unchanged even in patients who were definitely allergic but who had become symptom-free under hypnosis, as did the passive transmission of the antibody - even in deep somnambul hypnosis. The donor and recipient remained unaffected, his interest in allergy as a biological phenomenon and as a disease was aroused.
Allergy research in Lübeck
In 1932 Hansen was appointed head of the municipal hospitals in Lübeck , to which he remained loyal until he reached the age limit in 1957. Through his determined and systematic leadership, which included the establishment of theoretical institutes and clinical specialist departments, he expanded it into a modern clinic. For clinical allergy research - a stepchild of general medicine who was initially smiled at with pity at the time - he created a home there with an allergy station and corresponding laboratories. He put the allergic pathogenesis on an equal footing with the general, previously valid modes of development of diseases. We owe our understanding of the abundance of allergic manifestations of illness and their possible assignment to the allergic shock syndrome to Hansen's clear definition of the term “ shock fragment ” - an explanation for its primary manifestation of the “contact rule” he conceived.
A large number of papers aimed to clarify various factors and their significance for the occurrence of allergic diseases, including in particular occupational reasons (“forced” sensitization). The result of the fruitful exchange of ideas at the Lübeck symposia with theorists and clinicians from all disciplines at home and abroad was the standard work Allergie , published by him , which experienced three editions (1939, 1943, 1957); the streamlined 4th edition was designed by him and then published in 1967 by Max Werner. He was so far u. a. Co-editor of Therapeutische Technik (1956) and contributed to the textbook of internal medicine by Helmut Dennig (1950).
Desensitization as a therapy
With the then so-called " desensitization " against hay fever by means of helis (Bayer), he introduced a therapeutic method in Europe as early as 1928, which in principle is still practiced today. Allergy research and therapy have gained fundamental knowledge and new impulses through his work and his school since 1927. They were decisive for his international reputation as one of the most important internists of his time. The German Society for Allergology and Clinical Immunology (DGAKI) together with the Society for Pediatric Allergology and Environmental Medicine (GPA) awards the Karl Hansen Memorial Prize, now endowed with € 5,000, every three years .
Activity as a functionary
The admirer Fridtjof Nansens and cosmopolitan felt the Second World War so painful because it largely destroyed the international connections he had established. As long-time secretary and 2nd chairman of the DGAKI, which he co-founded in 1951, he was particularly concerned with establishing new contacts after the war, and he again played a leading role in the relevant international bodies (International Society for Allergology and Immunology, Collegium Internationale Allergologicum, International Commission of the American Academy of Allergy). For many years he was President of the International Society for Asthmology (Interasma). In 1957 - in the anniversary year of its 75th existence - he was President of the German Society for Internal Medicine , whose congress he opened with a programmatic address.
Further research areas and publications
In addition to allergies, Hansen was scientifically active in a number of other areas of internal medicine. As an assistant to the physiologist Max von Frey in Würzburg in the early twenties, partly in collaboration with Paul Hoffmann, he worked on pioneering studies on reflex physiology (“relief reflex”), Trousseau's phenomenon and the electrical excitability of the peripheral nervous system. This physiological approach had a major influence on his later medical activity. On neurological issues, he published, in addition to numerous journal articles, the books The reflectoric and algetic disease signs (with H. von Staa, 1938) and Segmental Innervation (with H. Schliack, 1962). In 1928 he was co-founder and then for decades the editor of Der Nervenarzt.
Other monographs include pulmonary tuberculosis and pregnancy (with Friedrich Schultze-Rhonhof , 1931), native sprue (with H. von Staa, 1936) and intestinal burn (Enteritis necroticans, ed., 1949). He has also expressed himself several times on questions of medical philosophy, for example in the article Doctor and Patient (1954) and as a co-author of The Human Being in Our Time (1956). In the reading book for doctors (1st edition 1950) with contributions from Plato to Rilke, he was concerned with “awakening understanding for the spiritual and ethical foundations of this profession”. He wrote an obituary for Hans Prinzhorn and paid tribute to Ludolf von Krehl on his 100th birthday. See in detail the selected bibliography by Erich Fuchs , which lists 321 titles (“Allergie und Asthma”, issue 4/5 1963).
Medical Academy in Lübeck
Not least because of his forward-looking personnel policy with a collective of chief physicians and professors, Hansen laid the foundation stone for the later establishment of a medical academy in Lübeck , especially since the beginning of 1950, for which he was repeatedly and emphatically committed, but which he was no longer allowed to experience.
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| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Hansen, Karl |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German internist, allergist and neurologist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | May 7, 1893 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | trier |
| DATE OF DEATH | October 20, 1962 |
| Place of death | Neckargemünd |