Author ~ Werner Forssmann

Title ~ Experiments on myself, Memoirs of a surgeon in Germany

Condition ~ Very Good

Dust jacket is rubbed with creases and chipping to the edges

Closed tear at the front bottom of jacket.

Internally light marks and light foxing, not price clipped with no inscriptions or notes.

Edition ~ First English Edition, This appears to be the first American edition which has then had British labels applied.

Publisher ~ St. James Press

Published ~ 1974

Language ~ English

Pages ~ 352

Format Hardcover


Werner Forssmann was born in Berlin, where he also studied medicine. As a newly educated doctor, he served in Eberswalde and conducted his Nobel Prize-awarded experiment there in 1929. His experimentation met resistance, however, which impeded continued research in the field. After being chief surgeon in Dresden and Berlin, Werner Forssmann served as a doctor in the army during World War II. After the war ended, he worked as a district medical officer, among other things. Werner Forssmann and his wife, also a doctor, had six children


In 1929 the physician Werner Forssmann saw a picture in a book showing how a tube was inserted into the heart of a horse through a vein. A balloon at the other end of the tube showed changes in pressure. He was convinced that a similar experiment could be carried out on people. Despite the fact that his boss forbade him, Werner Forssmann conducted the experiment on himself. From the crook of his arm he inserted a thin catheter through a vein into his heart and took an X-ray photo. The experiment paved the way for many types of heart studies.  In 1956 he was awarded, together with André Cournand and Dickinson W. Richards, the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine and he was, in the same year, appointed Honorary Professor of Surgery and Urology at the Johannes Gutenberg University, Mainz.

£40

Accepted Payment: PayPal, Cheque or Cash on Collection, North Midlands