Salvatore Luigi Pisani

Salvatore Luigi Pisani CMG, MD (27 May 1828, in Birgu – 27 October 1908, in Zejtun) was a Maltese doctor, renowned professor of anatomy, surgery, midwifery and gynaecology.

Biography The only son of Luigi Pisani and Concetta Inglott, Salvatore Luigi Pisani was born in a family of physicians. His homonymous grandfather had died in the plague of 1813. His father was superintendent of the Gozo Hospital, and later of the Central Hospital in Floriana from 1850 to 1865, when he died of typhoid fever, probably contracted on the job. Pisani was particularly impressed by the cholera epidemics that had struck Malta in 1837 and 1850, and dedicated his years of study to the causes of the disease.

Pisani studied at the Lyceum and graduated as M.D. from the University of Malta (1850) and the University of Edinburgh (1853). The same year he obtained a Licentiate and a diploma in midwifery at the Royal College of Surgeons. The first Maltese to graduate at that Edinburgh, he was awarded a gold medal and commended for his thesis 'On the Epidemics of Cholera in Malta and Gozo.' To complete his studies, he also visited several medical centres in London, Paris, Berlin, Vienna, and Italy. In May 1854, he became a member of the German Medical Society in Paris.

Returning to Malta on sick leave in early 1855, Pisani was appointed medical officer in charge of the St Julian's camp. He left the British Army in July 1856, with the most solid reputation. Pisani constructed Villa Sans Souci in Marsaxlokk in the 1870s. He lived at "his commodious and comfortable Villa Sans Souci situated in a lovely spot between Casal Zeitun and Marsascirocco where he quietly passed away on October 27, 1908, after a somewhat prolonged illness. The funeral cortege offered an unmistakable proof of the high esteem in which Prof. Pisani was held, comprising as it did, the elite of society, a good many following the hearse in carriages from Sans Souci to the Addolorata Cemetery, where many more joined the procession".

Works

Pisani's publications included "Ktieb il Qabla" [Malta, 1883]; "Twissijiet fuq il mard tal-korla" [Malta, 1885]; "Fuq il mard tat-tfal u kif nilghulu" [Malta, 1885]; ad "Report on the Cholera Epidemic in the year 1887" [Malta, 1888]. In 1896 he initiated a series of annual public health reports.

Pisani was also a renowned numismatic and art collector, publishing "Medagliere di Malta e Gozo dall'epoca Fenicia all'attuale Regnante S.M. La Regina Vittoria" [Malta, 1896] and bequeathed his coin and medal collection (worth tens of thousands of pounds) to the Monetarium of the National Museum in 1899.