ERICHSEN,JOHN,ERIC - OBITUARY

John Eric Erichsen (Fig. 1) is included in the Profiles in Cardiology series because of his pioneering observations on the consequences of e xperimental ligation of the coronary arteries and his important book o n aneurysms, published more than 150 years ago.(1,2) The son of a succ essful Danish banker, Erichsen was born in Copenhagen on July 19, 1818 ; but he also had strong family ties to Great Britain: his mother and paternal grandmother were both English. It is not surprising, therefor e, that young John was educated in England. After preliminary schoolin g at Mansion House, Hammersmith, Erichsen began to study medicine at U niversity College, London. His studies were supplemented by postgradua te work in Paris, then the world's leading center of clinical medicine and medical education.(3) Shortly after Erichsen returned to London a s house surgeon at University College Hospital, he began a series of a nimal experiments designed to study the effects of coronary occlusion. Although French physician Pierre Chirac studied the effects of ligati ng the coronary arteries in a dog in 1698, there was little interest i n the subject until the nineteenth century.(4) Erichsen wondered what effect blocking the coronary circulation would have on the heart's act ion. He also hoped to clarify the relationship between abrupt coronary occlusion and sudden death. The results of his innovative experiments were published in an 1842 paper, On the Influence of the Coronary Cir culation on the Action of the Heart.(5)