Who are Sir Victor Horsley and Hugh Cairns?
Sir Victor Horsley (b. 14 April 1857- 16 July 1916) was an accomplished scientist, activist, experimenter, social reformer, and author. He is best known for pioneering efforts in neurosurgery, becoming the first doctor to be appointed “Brain Surgeon” in the world. Horsley is also known for the discovering the cause of rabies and eradicating the disease in the United Kingdom
Hugh Cairns (b. 26 June 1896- 18 July 1952) was an Australian doctor who followed in the
footsteps of his predecessor, Victor Horsley, and is also well known for establishing neurosurgery as a medical field in its own right in the UK. Cairns received a South Australian Rhodes scholarship to Oxford, where he met American doctor, Harvey Cushing (the Father of Neurosurgery). Cairns travelled to Boston to study with Cushing and began specializing in Neurosurgery. Along with Geoffrey Jefferson and Norman Dott, Cairns established Neurosurgery as a field in Britain. Cairns significantly reduced the neurosurgical mortality rates during World War II with his innovations, and was an advocate for crash helmets, substantially reducing mortality rates amongst motorcyclists as well.
Amongst his many significant contributions to the field of neurosurgery, Cairns also spent his time improving the designs of numerous surgical instruments, including the Horsley-Cairns Rongeurs (also called Bone Holding Forceps), featured in the exhibition Instrumental Change!
Written by Stephanie Hinton.