Francis Xavier Dercum

Francis Xavier Dercum (August 10, 1856 – April 24, 1931) was an American physician and educator who first described the disease Adiposis dolorosa (also known as Dercum's disease). He served as chief of the Nervous Disease Clinic at the University of Pennsylvania and as professor of neurology at Jefferson Medical College. He worked as a neurologist at the Philadelphia General Hospital for almost 25 years. He partnered with Eadweard Muybridge to create some of the first motion picture images of patients with neurological movement disorders. He served as editor of A Textbook on Nervous Disorders which was the first multi-authored textbook in neurology. He served as president of the American Philosophical Society. He treated Ima Hogg, the first lady of Texas, for severe depression in 1918 and President Woodrow Wilson after a stroke in 1919.

Early life and education Dercum was born August 10, 1856, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to Ernest Albert and Susanna Erhart Dercum. His father was a successful businessman and sold books and grain. He was educated at the local public schools and graduated from Central High School in 1873. He attended the University of Pennsylvania medical school. He received his medical degree in 1877 and a Doctorate of Philosophy in 1878. He received an honorary Doctor of Science degree in 1927 from Jefferson Medical College.

Career He began his medical practice and served as a pathologist at the State Mental Hospital in Norristown, Pennsylvania. He took an unpaid role as neurologist at the Philadelphia General Hospital in 1887 and worked there for approximately 25 years. He published over 200 articles including several textbooks, in the medical areas of anatomy, physiology, pathology, psychology, and therapeutics. He served as editor of A Textbook on Nervous Disorders which was the first multi-authored textbook in neurology. and served as its president. Dercum continued as the president's physician until Wilson's death in 1924

Publications A Textbook on Nervous Diseases, Philadelphia: Lea Brothers & Co., 1895 Report of Three Cases of Beri-Beri, Journal of Nervous & Mental Disease, 20(2) (Feb. 1895): 103–109 Two cases of Adiposa Dolorosa, Transactions, College of Physicians of Philadelphia, 1902 Rest, Mental Therapeutics, Suggestion, 1903 A Clinical Manual of Mental Diseases. Philadelphia; London: W. B. Saunders Co., 1913 “The Treatment of Mental Affections as they are Met with in General Practice,” New York Medical Journal (March 13, 1915) Hysteria and accident compensation: Nature of Hysteria and the Lesson of the Post-Litigation Results, Philadelphia: The Geo. T. Bisel Co., 1916 Metabolism in Insanity, Journal of the American Medical Association, (April 15, 1916): 1183–1188 A Clinical Manual of Mental Diseases, 1917 Rest, Suggestion, and Other Therapeutic Measures in Nervous and Mental Disease. Philadelphia: P. Blakiston's Son & Co., 1917 The Interpretation of the Neuroses: Biologic, Pathologic and Clinical Considerations, together with an Evaluation of the Psychogenic Factors, Journal of the American Medical Association, (April 28, 1917): 1223–1227 An Essay on the Physiology of Mind: An Interpretation based on Biological, Morphological, Physical and Chemical Considerations. Philadelphia; London: W. B. Saunders Co., 1922 The Biology of the Internal Secretions, Philadelphia and London: W.B. Saunders Co., 1924