John Cheyne

Biography

• Born February 3, 1777 Leith, Scotland
• 1790-1792: As the son of a surgeon, Cheyne assisted his father from the age of 13 with dressing and bleeding patients
• 1792-1795: Cheyne commenced medical studies at the University of Edinburgh at the age of 15. He graduated as a doctor at age 18.
• 1795: After graduating, Cheyne served with the military as a surgeon in the Artillery Corps in Woolwich
• 1798: Served at the Battle of Vinegar Hill
• 1799: Left the military and returned to Scotland to join his father’s practice at Ordinance Hospital in Leath
• 1801: Studied pathology and dissection and together with Charles Bell published Essays of Diseases of Children
• 1804: Married Sarah Macartney
• 1809: Left Scotland and moved to Dublin, Ireland
• 1811-1817: Worked as a physician at Meath Hospital, Dublin
• 1813-1819: Appointed professor of medicine at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland. Here he also taught war medicine
• 1818: Described Cheyne-Stokes breathing in the Dublin Hospital Reports article: A case of apoplexy in which the fleshy part of the heart was converted into fat
• 1820: Became the Physician General to British forces in Ireland. This was the highest medical rank in Ireland
• 1825: Developed depression following the death of a close friend
• 1831: Due to ongoing ill health, Cheyne retired to his estate in Buckinghamshire, England
• Died January 31, 1836, Buckinghamshire, England. His work on mental disorders was published posthumously in 1843: Essays on the parital derangement of the mind in supposed connexion with religion

Medical Eponyms

Cheyne-Stokes Respiration (1818)

Abnormal pattern of breathing which oscillates between hyperventilation and apnoea seen in the end stages of illness

Hippocrates first described Cheyne-Stokes breathing over two millennia earlier as ‘respiration throughout like that of a man recollecting himself, and rare, and large’.

Major Publications

• Cheyne J. A case of apoplexy in which the fleshy part of the heart was converted into fat. Dublin Hospital Reports. 1818;2:216-223. [Reprinted: Cardiac Classics. 1941;1:317-320] [Cheyne-Stokes Respiration]
• Cheyne J. Essay I. Of cynanche trachealis, or croup. In: Essays on the diseases of children: with cases and dissections. 1801
• Cheyne J. Essay II. Of the bowel complaints; more immediately connected with the biliary secretion, adn particularly of atrophia ablactatorum or weaning brash. In: Essays on the diseases of children: with cases and dissections. 1808
• Cheyne J. Essay III on hydrpcephalus acutus, or dropsy in the brain. In: Essays on the diseases of children: with cases and dissections.1808
• Cheyne J. Essays on the parital derangement of the mind in supposed connexion with religion. 1843

References

Biography

• Ormsby LH. John Cheyne. Medical history of the Meath Hospital and County Dublin Infirmary, 1888: 112-115
• O’Brien ET. Dublin Masters of Clinical Expression: I. John Cheyne (1777-1836). J Irish Colleges Physicians & Surg 1974;3:91-93.
• Pearce JMS. Cheyne-Stokes respiration. Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery & Psychiatry 2002;72:595.
• Fletcher A, Moor D. The lives and works of John Cheyne (1777-1836) and William Stokes (1804-1878). J Intensive Care Soc. 2017; 18(4): 323-325.
• Bibliography. Cheyne, John 1777-1836. WorldCat Identities

Eponymous terms

• Willius FA, Keys TE. John Cheyne (1777-1836). Cardiac Classics. 1941;1:317-320
• Lyons JB. John Cheyne’s classic monographs. Journal of the History of the Neurosciences 1995;4(1):27-35.