Ernst Viktor von Leyden

Ernst Viktor von Leyden (April 20, 1832 – October 5, 1910) was a German internist from Danzig.

Leyden studied medicine at the Friedrich-Wilhelms-Institut in Berlin, and was a pupil of Johann Lukas Schönlein (1793-1864) and Ludwig Traube (1818-1876). He was a medical professor at several universities, including Königsberg, Strassburg and Berlin. Leyden was an important influence to the career of Ludwig Edinger (1855-1918), and during his tenure at the University of Königsberg worked closely with Otto Spiegelberg (1830-1881) and Friedrich Daniel von Recklinghausen (1833-1910). One of his better known assistants at Königsberg was Hermann Nothnagel (1841-1905).

In the 1890s (from 1894) he was a physician to Czar Alexander III of Russia. The political philosopher Wolfgang von Leyden was his grandson.^[1]

Leyden specialized in neurological diseases, and was a leader in establishing proper hospital facilities for tuberculosis patients. He wrote articles on a wide array of medical topics, including works on tabes dorsalis and poliomyelitis. In 1899 he published the two-volume Handbuch der Ernährungstherapie (Textbook of Dietetic Therapy).

Eponymous medical terms named for Ernst von Leyden

• Charcot-Leyden crystals: colorless crystals found in the sputum of asthma patients, or in the faecal matter of amoebic and ulcerative colitis; named along with neurologist Jean-Martin Charcot.
• Leyden's neuritis: A neuritis in which nerve fibres are replaced by fatty tissue.
• Leyden's paralysis II: A fatal form of paralysis of the extremities that follows epileptiform seizures; seen in patients with hemorrhage of the pons and medulla oblongata.
• Leyden-Möbius syndrome: Pelvic muscular dystrophy; named along with neurologist Paul Julius Möbius.
• Westphal-Leyden ataxia: Acute ataxia that begins in childhood; named along with neurologist Karl Friedrich Otto Westphal.

References

• Ernst Viktor von Leyden @ Who Named It