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Alix Joffroy

Alix Joffroy (1844 – 1908)

Alix Joffroy (1844 – 1908) was a French neurologist, psychiatrist and anatomopathologist.

Studied neurology under Jean-Martin Charcot and Pierre Marie. Joffroy was a pioneer in research in the neuropathology of progressive muscular atrophy (Charcot-Marie atrophy); infantile paralysis; glosso-labio-pharyngeal paralysis; and a particular form of sclerosis he called ‘amyotrophic lateral sclerosis’ (Charcot Disease). Joffroy demonstrated that the common and fundamental character of these diseases is the lesion of the nerve cells of the moto-neuron.

Eponymously affiliated with Joffroy sign in Graves ophthalmopathy

Biography

  • Born 16 December 1844 Stainville (Meuse)
  • 1865 – medical ‘externe’ with low grades and little hope of progression in the field of medicine until taken under the wing of Alfred Vulpian (1826 – 1887)
  • 1873 – MD, Paris. Defended Thèse “De l’influence des excitations cutanées sur la circulation et la calorification
  • 1874-1879 Senior registrar of Lasègue at the Pitié hospital
  • 1893-1908 Professor of clinical psychiatry, Clinique des Maladies Mentales et de l’Encéphale
  • 1899 – First president of the society of neurology, Paris
  • 1902 – Elected to the Academy of medicine
  • Died 24 November 1908 Paris, France

Medical Eponyms

Joffroy sign (1893)

Absence of wrinkling of the forehead when a patient with Graves Ophthalmopathy looks up with the head bent forwards.

Controversies

Time, the best judge of human work, has brought fame to his research but not yet to his name.

Tiberghien 2010

Major Publications

References


eponymictionary

the names behind the name

BA MA (Oxon) MBChB (Edin) FACEM FFSEM. Emergency physician, Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital.  Passion for rugby; medical history; medical education; and asynchronous learning #FOAMed evangelist. Co-founder and CTO of Life in the Fast lane | Eponyms | Books | Twitter |

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