Sydenham << SIHD uhn uhm >> Thomas (1624-1689), an English physician, was one of the most widely admired doctors of his time. He believed that medicine must be learned through experience at the patient’s bedside and that the practice of medicine should be based on observation rather than book learning or theory. He was a keen observer and gave excellent descriptions of gout, scarlet fever, measles, and influenza.
Sydenham was born in early September 1624 at Wynford Eagle, Dorset. He served as a captain in the army led by Oliver Cromwell during the English Civil War in the 1640’s. Later, Sydenham completed his medical studies at Oxford University and opened a practice. He came to believe that medical treatment was justified by results, not by physiological theory. Experience led him to use the plant cinchona, from which quinine is extracted, as a remedy for certain fevers. Many physicians at that time opposed using specific medicines for specific ailments.
Sydenham worked to improve understanding of the origins and nature of disease. He suggested that diseases could be classified as plants had been. Sydenham also believed that changes in the atmosphere led to epidemics. His book Observationes Medicae (1676) is considered to be the first textbook on clinical medicine. He died on Dec. 29, 1689.
