Medical Advances Timeline: 1746-1799

When was the stethoscope invented? Did Civil War doctors have hypodermic needles? When did surgeons first begin to use anesthesia for operations? What were the origins of Neurology? When were the first nursing schools established? Did mid-19th century physicians perform blood transfusions? When was an ambulance corps approved by Congress? See the progression as medicine transformed from an “art” to a “science” . . .

1746
- The compressive bandage to stop bleeding from wounds is introduced.

1747
- Primae lineae physiologiae by Albrecht von Haller, Switzerland, is the first textbook on physiology.
- Benjamin Robins, an English military engineer, addresses the Royal Society on the physics of a spinning projectile.

1749
- The Philadelphia Academy is founded. It will later evolve to become the University of Pennsylvania.
- Sign language for deaf-mutes is invented by Portuguese Giacobbo Rodriguez.

1751
- The first mental asylums are established in London.

1752
- Philadelphian Benjamin Franklin invents the lightning conductor.

1753
- James Lind, British naval surgeon, publishes his classic work on the treatment and prevention of scurvy by the use of citrus fruits.

1754
- The first female M.D. is graduated from the University of Halle, Germany.

1761
- Medical doctor B.G. Morgagni publishes On the Causes of Diseases in Bologna. It is regarded as the beginning of pathological anatomy.

1762
- First veterinary facility in Europe is established after centuries of wars, disease epidemics, livestock plagues and food shortages.

1765
- The first medical school in America opens at the College of Pennsylvania.

1766
- English surveyors Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon draw the boundary between Pennsylvania and Maryland, the Mason-Dixon Line. It later separates the slave and free regions.

1767
- English theologian and philosopher Joseph Priestly publishes The History and Present State of Electricity.

1771
- Italian physician and physicist Luigi Galvani performs the first experiments with bioelectricity: the relationship of electrical patterns and the nervous system.
- New York Hospital is founded.

1772
- The Paris Faculty of Medicine declares potatoes to be an edible food.

1777
- American engineer David Bushnell invents the torpedo.
- The American Continental Congress adopts the Stars and Stripes as its flag.

1779
- The first Children’s Clinic is established in London.

1780
- The American Academy of Sciences is established in Boston. Medicine is still considered to be an “art”.

1788
- New York is declared the federal capital of the United States.

1790
- Philadelphia, Pennsylvania becomes the federal capital of the United States.
Washington, D.C. is founded.

1791
- Vermont becomes a state of the U.S.

1792
- Kentucky becomes a state of the U.S.
- The world’s first chemical society is founded in Philadelphia.

1794
- The United States Navy is founded.

1795
- The first elite military medical schools are established in Paris and Berlin.
- Based on James Lind’s 1753 findings, lemon and lime water for the prevention and treatment of scurvey, was stocked aboard all British naval vessels.

1796
- Tennessee becomes a state of the U.S.
- English physician Edward Jenner introduces a vaccination against smallpox.

1798
- The Department of the Treasury establishes The Marine Hospital Service, authorizing marine hospitals for the care of American merchant seamen.

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