Georg Kelling (7 July 1866 – 14 February 1945) was a German internist and

surgeon In modern medicine, a surgeon is a medical professional who performs surgery. Although there are different traditions in different times and places, a modern surgeon usually is also a licensed physician or received the same medical training as ...

who was a laparoscopy pioneer and in 1901 performed the first

laparoscopic surgery Laparoscopy () is an operation performed in the abdomen or pelvis using small incisions (usually 0.5–1.5 cm) with the aid of a camera. The laparoscope aids diagnosis or therapeutic interventions with a few small cuts in the abdomen.Medl ...

on a dog. He studied medicine at the Universities of

Leipzig Leipzig ( , ; Upper Saxon: ) is the most populous city in the German state of Saxony. Leipzig's population of 605,407 inhabitants (1.1 million in the larger urban zone) as of 2021 places the city as Germany's eighth most populous, as wel ...

and

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

. He earned his medical doctorate in 1890, and later worked as a physician at the city hospital in Dresden. In the 1890s, Kelling devised an esophagoscope Kelling specialized in

gastrointestinal The gastrointestinal tract (GI tract, digestive tract, alimentary canal) is the tract or passageway of the digestive system that leads from the mouth to the anus. The GI tract contains all the major organs of the digestive system, in humans and ...

physiology Physiology (; ) is the scientific study of functions and mechanisms in a living system. As a sub-discipline of biology, physiology focuses on how organisms, organ systems, individual organs, cells, and biomolecules carry out the chemical ...

and

anatomy Anatomy () is the branch of biology concerned with the study of the structure of organisms and their parts. Anatomy is a branch of natural science that deals with the structural organization of living things. It is an old science, having its ...

. He is credited with performing the first

laparoscopic Laparoscopy () is an operation performed in the abdomen or pelvis using small incisions (usually 0.5–1.5 cm) with the aid of a camera. The laparoscope aids diagnosis or therapeutic interventions with a few small cuts in the abdomen.Medli ...

examination, a procedure he referred to as " celioscopy". In 1901 he performed the procedure on the abdomen of a dog using a Nitze-

cystoscope Cystoscopy is endoscopy of the urinary bladder via the urethra. It is carried out with a cystoscope. The urethra is the tube that carries urine from the bladder to the outside of the body. The cystoscope has lenses like a telescope or microscope ...

. Prior to cystoscopic viewing of the abdomen, Kelling insufflated it with filtered air via a device known as a

trocar A trocar (or trochar) is a medical or veterinary device that is made up of an awl (which may be a metal or plastic sharpened or non-bladed tip), a cannula (essentially a hollow tube), and a seal. Trocars are placed through the abdomen during lap ...

. Insufflation was used to create a

pneumoperitoneum Pneumoperitoneum is pneumatosis (abnormal presence of air or other gas) in the peritoneal cavity, a potential space within the abdominal cavity. The most common cause is a perforated abdominal organ, generally from a perforated peptic ulcer, althou ...

in order to prevent intra-abdominal bleeding. Kelling and his wife were killed during the Allied bombing of Dresden in 1945.

References

*
Google-translated biography of Georg Kelling
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kelling, Georg 1866 births 1945 deaths German surgeons Physicians from Dresden German civilians killed in World War II Deaths by airstrike during World War II

See also

References