PEDIATRICS Vol. 77 No. 5 May 1986, pp. 680-686
This Article
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow P3Rs: Submit a response
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me when P3Rs are posted
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow E-mail this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My File Cabinet
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrow reprints & permissions
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via CrossRef
Right arrow Citing Articles via Google Scholar
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Pearson, H. A.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by Pearson, H. A.

Lectures on the Diseases of Children by Eli Ives, MD, of Yale and New Haven: America's First Academic Pediatrician

Howard A. Pearson MD1

1 From the Department of Pediatrics, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut

Eli Ives of New Haven, CT and Yale University was a successful and respected practitioner, professor, and medical statesman. For nearly 40 years between 1813 and 1852, he lectured to an estimated 1,500 Yale medical students on materia medica, botany, the theory and practice of medicine, and the diseases of children. Some of those lectures, meticulously recorded in flowing penmanship by Yale medical students during this time, are preserved in the manuscript and archives section of Yale University's Sterling Library. The Ives Lectures on Diseases of Children represent the first systematic and dedicated American course of instruction in what today is known as the specialty of pediatrics.

During the 1820s, Ives' title at Yale was Professor of Materia Medica, Botany, and the Diseases of Children and so he held the earliest American academic appointment in pediatrics. There were other early 19th century academic physicians with demonstrated interest and involvement in children and their diseases.1 These pediatric pioneers included William Potts Dewees of the University of Pennsylvania and John Eberle of the Jefferson and Cincinatti Medical Colleges who authored early American pediatric textbooks. However, they did not have formal academic titles nor did they present separate substantive courses in pediatrics at their institutions.

By the latter half of the 19th century pediatrics began to attain academic recognition in the United States. Dr Abraham Jacobi of New York established a children's clinic at the New York Medical College in 1861. He held the academic title of Professor of Infantile Pathology and Therapeutics and lectured on the diseases of children.

Submitted on May 24, 1985
Accepted on May 24, 1985