Antoine Germain Labarraque

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Antoine Germain Labarraque
Portrait of Labarraque
Born(1777-03-28)28 March 1777
Oloron-Sainte-Marie, Pyrénées-Atlantiques , France
Died9 December 1850(1850-12-09) (aged 73)
near Paris, France
NationalityFrench
EducationCollege of Pharmacy, Paris
Occupation(s)chemist and pharmacist
Known forusing sodium hypochlorite as a disinfectant and deodoriser
Parents
  • François Labarraque (father)
  • Christine Sousbielle (mother)

Antoine Germain Labarraque (28 March 1777 – 9 December 1850)[1] was a French chemist and pharmacist, notable for formulating and finding important uses for "Eau de Labarraque" or "Labarraque's solution", a solution of sodium hypochlorite[2] widely used as a disinfectant and deodoriser.[3]

Labarraque's use of

Lister
began to establish the theoretical basis of this practice.

Labarraque's solutions and techniques remain in use to the present day.

Life and work

Early years and career

Labarraque was born in Oloron-Sainte-Marie, in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques department, on 28 March 1777, the son of François Labarraque and Christine Sousbielle. He spent over 2 years as a pupil of a pharmacist called Préville in Orthez, but was then drafted into the army as a "Grenadier de la Tour d'Auvergne". He was promoted to battlefield seargent, and eventually became pharmacist-in-chief at the military hospital of Berra. He contracted Typhus and after his recovery was discharged from the military in 1795.[1][3]

Having taken a liking to Pharmacy, he went to Montpellier to study under Jean-Antoine Chaptal. He then went to Paris, where he worked as a pharmacist and studied at the "College of Pharmacy" under various teachers including Louis Nicolas Vauquelin. He qualified as a master of Pharmacy in 1805, and in the same year published a work, "Sur la dissolution du phosphore" (on the dissolution of Phosphorus) followed by "Sur les electuaires" (On electuaries).[4] He became a member of the "Sociétés de pharmacie et de médecine" in 1809 after presenting a paper, "Sur les teintures alcooliques et quelques expériences sur la teinture alcoolique de benjoin" (Alcoholic

Benzoin). Subsequently, Labarraque took part in several commissions to examine presentations made to the society.[1][3]

"Labarraque's solution"

In France (as elsewhere) there was a need to process

Société d'Encouragement pour l'Industrie nationale offered a prize for the discovery of a method, chemical or mechanical, which could be used to separate the peritoneal membrane of animal intestines without causing putrefaction.[3][5]

Labarraque experimented with different compositions, finding that a solution of "chloride of lime" (

francs, by showing how a number of these solutions that were made from free chlorine and later gave rise to it, could be employed both to fumigate the workshops, and to loosen the membranes one from another without allowing the offensive odour to escape.[5] He freely acknowledged the part that his predecessors, such as Berthollet (1748–1822), had played in his discovery.[1]

Invention of antisepsis techniques with chlorine

In 1824, Labarraque was called in to assist after the death of King

Légion d'Honneur (1827) and the "Conseil de Salubrité" (council of health, 1836).[1][3]

Labarraque's research resulted in chlorides and hypochlorites of lime (calcium hypochlorite) and of sodium (

exhumations,[8] embalming, during outbreaks of epidemic illness, fever, Blackleg (disease) in cattle, etc.[3]

Labarraque's chlorinated lime and soda solutions had been advocated in 1828 to prevent infection (called "contagious infection", and presumed to be transmitted by "

miasmas") and also to treat putrefaction of existing wounds, including septic wounds.[8]
In this 1828 work, Labarraque recommended for the doctor to breathe chlorine, wash his hands with chlorinated lime, and even sprinkle chlorinated lime about the patient's bed, in cases of "contagious infection."

During the Paris cholera outbreak of 1832, large quantities of so-called chloride of lime were used to disinfect the capital. This was not simply modern calcium chloride, but contained chlorine gas dissolved in lime-water (dilute calcium hydroxide) to form calcium hypochlorite (chlorinated lime). Labarraque's discovery helped to remove the terrible stench of decay from hospitals and dissecting rooms, and, by doing so, effectively deodorised the Latin Quarter of Paris.[6] These "putrid miasmas" were thought by many to be responsible for the spread of "contagion" and "infection"- both words used before the germ theory of infection.

Perhaps the most famous application of Labarraque's chlorine and

childbed fever
.

Long after the illustrious chemist's death, during the Custer campaigns in North Dakota (1873–1874), chief-surgeon, Dr. Henry H Ruger (known as "Big Medicine Man" by the Indians) used "Eau de Labarraque" to prevent further deterioration in cases of frostbite.[9]

Much later, during World War I in 1916, a standardized and diluted modification of Labarraque's solution containing hypochlorite and boric acid was developed by Henry Drysdale Dakin. Called Dakin's solution, the method of wound irrigation with chlorinated solutions allowed antiseptic treatment of a wide variety of open wounds, long before the antibiotic era. A modified version of this solution is still employed in wound irrigation, where it continues to be effective against multiply-antibiotic resistant bacteria (see Century Pharmaceuticals).

Death

Antoine Germain Labarraque died near Paris on 9 December 1850.[3]

Other written works

  • L'Art du boyauderie (Paris, 1822).
  • De l'emploi des chlorures d'oxide de sodium et de chaux. (Paris, 1825).[10]
  • Scott, James (trans.). On the disinfecting properties of Labarraque's preparations of chlorine (S. Highley, 1828).
  • Manière de se servir du chlorure d'oxyde de sodium soit pour panser les plaies de mauvaise nature, soit comme moyen d'assainissement des lieux insalubres et de désinfection des matières animales (Paris, 1825).
  • Note sur une asphyxie produite par les émanations des materiaux retirés d'une fosse d'aisance; suivant d'Expériences sur les moyens de désinfection propres à prévenir de pareils accidents (Paris, 1825).
  • Sur la préparation des chlorures désinfectants (Paris, 1826).
  • Rapport au conseil de salubrité de Paris sur l'exhumation des cadavres déposés en juillet 1832 dans les caveaux de l'église Saint-Eustache.

Labarraque also wrote a large number of dissertations and reports which appeared in journals and scientific reviews.[3]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Maurice Bouvet. Les grands pharmaciens: Labarraque (1777-1850) (Revue d'histoire de la pharmacie, 1950, Volume 38, no. 128, pp. 97-107).
  2. ^ Myers, R. L. 100 Most Important Chemical Compounds - A Reference Guide (ABC-CLIO, 2007) p. 260.
  3. ^
    Nouvelle biographie générale
    , volume 28 (1859), columns 323-324.
  4. ^ "A medicine to be taken by licking or sucking; a substance of the consistence of honey for coughs etc." The century dictionary and cyclopedia, volume 4 (1896).
  5. ^ a b Knight, Charles. Arts and sciences, volume 1 (Bradbury, Evans & Co., 1867) p. 427.
  6. ^ a b Corbin, Alain. The Foul and the Fragrant: Odor and the French Social Imagination (Harvard University Press, 1988) pp. 121-2.
  7. ^ a b Andras Gédéon. Science and technology in medicine (Springer, 2006) p. 181-2.
  8. ^ a b Scott, James, transl. (1828). On the disinfecting properties of Labarraque's preparations of chlorine Published by S. Highley.
  9. ^ Bunyan, John. The Bunyan Method (Seafield Press, 2007) p. 31. Available for free download at Lulu.com.
  10. ^ De l'emploi des chlorures d'oxide de sodium et de chaux Archived 2012-07-25 at the Wayback Machine (www.jnorman.com - 10 Apr 2011).

Further reading

External links

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