Forehead reflector

Head mirror: for example, the examination of the larynx used

Use of a forehead mirror with an open flame as a light source (presumably a kerosene lamp) (1884)

Examination with a reflector mirror and light source attached to a tripod (1887)

A forehead reflector , forehead mirror or ophthalmoscope is a concave mirror mounted on a headband with a hole in the middle of the mirror for illuminating body orifices or for an ophthalmoscope . During the examination, the doctor aligns the forehead mirror in such a way that the organ to be examined is well illuminated by reflection from an external light source. At the same time, he can examine the illuminated area through the hole with one eye. The advantage here is that the doctor himself does not cast a shadow on the object to be examined. In addition, the mirror does not hinder access to the area to be examined (for example with tweezers).

The French doctor Pierre Borel , member of the Paris Académie des Sciences , used the concave mirror as an examination instrument in the 17th century. For the purpose of medical examinations and better illumination of body orifices and the fundus, he constructed a concave mirror to reflect and focus the light on the object to be examined.

Slightly modified, concave mirrors are still used today as forehead mirrors or reflectors in medical diagnostics, but are sometimes also replaced by devices such as the otoscope .

Web links

Commons : Head mirrors  - collection of images, videos and audio files

literature

• Feldmann, Harald: Pictures from the history of ear, nose and throat medicine . Median-Verl, Heidelberg 2003, ISBN 3-922766-81-1 , p. 448 .
• Feldmann, Harald: From the ear mirror to the eye mirror and back. The intertwined history of their invention and introduction to medical practice . In: Laryngo-Rhino-Otology . Thieme Verlag, 1995, doi : 10.1055 / s-2007-997830 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Nezhat's History of Endoscopy, Chapter 3 HTML Version , PDF Version