09.12.2019: In 1952, surgeon Roar Strøm (Figure 1) published an article detailing a case of illness in a 32-year-old man (1). Strøm had operated on the man the previous year for recurrent dyspeptic pain and discomfort. This is one of the first descriptions of the rare syndrome now known as Zollinger-Ellison syndrome (2–5) (see Box 1). We have recently confirmed the diagnosis with modern morphological techniques (6). Box 1 A concise summary of Zollinger-Ellison syndrome (ZES) (4, 5) Rare syndrome caused by one or more gastrin-producing tumours, so-called gastrinomas. The tumours are most often located in...

20.06.2019: Our interest in this story arose in relation to the article on the psychiatrist Augusta Rasmussen (1895–1979) (1). While working on that article, we constantly came across the name of Ragnhild Vogt Hauge, a person unknown to us. We became curious about who she was. Her story helps elucidate questions related to World War II and the legal purge of doctors in its aftermath. Material and method We have used the Retriever media archive, the National Library's digital archive bokhylla.no, the digital archives of the Aftenposten daily, and the following files in the National Archives of Norway: the...

30.10.2018: In 1923, the five-year-old Public Health Association published a folder with ten large-format posters, called House Maxims for Mothers and Children (Figure 1). Their objective was to promote child health through inculcation of a healthy way of life. The folder included an appeal from the physiologist Sophus Torup (1861–1937), chairman of the Public Health Association's academic committee. He hoped that the posters would 'find their way into all homes', he wrote. Professor Torup pointed to the major problem that illness during childhood could represent, and that this could be the origin of...

26.06.2018: In 1934, senior registrar Augusta Rasmussen (1895–1979) published a study of 77 cases involving sexual offences. She found that the women involved had suffered no mental injury from the abuse. In 1947, she published a study of the intelligence level of 310 Norwegian women who had formed relationships with German soldiers during the occupation. She found that nearly all of them were more or less retarded. Her conclusions, however, were not scientifically valid. Here we present Rasmussen's biography, academic background and scientific activity. In the autumn of 1932, senior registrar Gunhild...

30.10.2017: We like to believe that progress in the field of medicine is achieved through rational and scientific developments. This is not always the case. Many of our most frequently used drugs were discovered by pure chance, among them several antiepileptics. Many significant advances in the field of medicine have been based on mere coincidences, such as Alexander Fleming's discovery of penicillin in 1928. This is only one of many examples of drugs that were discovered by pure chance, for example when drugs are found to be effective against something completely different to what they were intended for...

20.12.2016: Hereditary haemochromatosis is a congenital disorder which affects the regulation of iron metabolism thus causing increased gut absorption of iron and a gradual build-up of pathologic iron deposits in the liver and other internal organs, joint capsules and the skin (1). From the age of 40 – 50 the iron overload may cause serious disease, which in its final stages is characterised by liver cirrhosis, diabetes and bronze-coloured skin, also referred to as «bronze diabetes». The prevalence in the ethnic Norwegian population of homozygous and heterozygous inheritance is 0.8 % and 12 – 15 %...

08.11.2016: Today there are Regional Committees for Medical and Health Research Ethics in every regional health authority. Their work is based on several laws, including the Health Research Act, the Personal Data Act and the Patients’ Rights Act (1), in addition to international guidelines on health research, like the Declaration of Helsinki (2). The Committees preapprove research projects involving human subjects and human biological data, and projects that use health data that has been collected through clinical practice or research (3). In their work, the Committees assess the risk that research...

05.07.2016: In 1833, Bergen Mental Hospital – popularly referred to as «Mentalen» – came into operation. As its name clearly suggests, it was meant to be, and in Bergen was also considered to be, a real therapeutic institution for people with mental illnesses. This notwithstanding, in the history of Norwegian psychiatry Mentalen has been virtually ignored. Or more correctly, it has been placed in the category of «bedlam» or «madhouse», meaning a pre-medical confinement facility and thus the opposite of an asylum. This shift in category happened already in the late 1840s and has since formed the basis for...

15.12.2015: Nine renal transplants were performed on humans at Harvard and Peter Bent Brigham hospitals between 1951 and 1953, three using living and six using cadaver donors. Four of these kidneys secreted urine 37 to 180 days before they were rejected. All the patients died. In their report David Hume (1917 – 73) and co-workers concluded that «renal homotransplantation has no place in the therapy of human patients at this time» (1). In 1954 Joseph Murray (1919 – 2012) transplanted a kidney between two identical twins at Peter Bent Brigham Hospital, Boston, USA (2). The recipient lived for 8 years...

10.12.2013: Tor Aas Christiansen (1917 – 1981) (Figure 1) commenced his hospital career in Porsgrunn in 1949. After a brief period at the Coastal Hospital in Hagevik he went to work at the Department of Pathology at the National Hospital in Oslo, and in the years 1954 – 1963 he worked at hospitals in Sarpsborg and in Rogaland and Aker Hospital. He had thus acquired a solid training in general surgery and pathology when he was employed as Senior Registrar at Drammen Hospital in 1963. In 1965 he was appointed Senior Consultant at Kongsberg Hospital. He continued working there until he died suddenly in 1981...