Eyeworld

MAY 2019 | EYEWORLD | 63 O Contact information Bohigian: g.bohigian@gmail.com Jokl: dhj6@cumc.columbia.edu Marmor: marmor@stanford.edu by Liz Hillman EyeWorld Senior Staff Writer "History is part of our heritage and our perspective on what we do. When we lose touch with it, we lose touch with where we've been, the mistakes we should not repeat, what good things we should try to remember," Dr. Mar- mor said. Dr. Marmor said his historical interests are in scientific ideas—how the retina works, how the eye as a whole works, how the eyes of animals work—and history of the arts. "It takes us out of our shells and into the world of why we do some of the things that we do," he said, adding, "arts that interface with ophthalmology are of special intrigue." Dr. Marmor recalled one of the first topics of ophthalmic history that he addressed professionally. It was in the 1970s when he was new at Stanford and his neighbors were politi- cal scientists who studied President Woodrow Wilson. President Wilson had a hemorrhage in one eye while he served at Princeton University, which led some critics to "read into all sorts of ominous signs into an ophthalmic event (likely a vein occlusion) that is not rare in people with vascular disease," Dr. Marmor said. "I began to talk about this with my col- leagues to clarify the history," Dr. Marmor said, adding later, "I've taken the time [to research topics in ophthalmic history] when I thought "Nothing is esteemed of consequence but that which contains something new. But in catching at the new, how often we risk losing that which is old, well-grounded and far better." —Eugene F. Cordell, MD 1 W hy do baby boys wear blue? This question from one of his chil- dren led George Bohigian, MD, down a research trail that would ultimately get him interested in various topics of ophthalmic history. He learned that people, especially in Middle Eastern and Mediterranean cultures, used to wear blue beads because it was thought to ward off evil. In these cultures, Dr. Bohigian explained, blue eyes were unusual and thus thought to be evil. From there, Dr. Bohigian became interested in symbols in medicine and ophthalmology. Rx, for example, is thought by some to come from the Eye of Horus, the Egyptian symbol of healing. OS, the abbreviation for left eye, stands for ocular sinister because the left was thought to be the evil side, Dr. Bohigian said. At the 2019 Cogan Ophthalmic History Society meeting, Dr. Bohigian presented on the symbol of medicine: the staff of Aesculapius with one snake coiled around it. Dr. Bohigian called this the true symbol of medicine but ex- plained that the caduceus, which has two snakes coiled around and a set of wings, a symbol of the god Hermes, is often confused as such. Aes- culapius was a Greek demigod healer, and the snake in ancient medicine was of interest due to its ability to shed its skin and regenerate. "Past is prologue, as Shakespeare said, because the stuff in history gives you a guide to the future; also, it gives you appreciation of the present," he said. For Michael Marmor, MD, an interest in medical/ophthalmic history goes back to college where his advisor was a historian of science and where he majored in mathematics because it had the fewest requirements of the sciences and left him time to explore courses in the arts, history, and humanities. Ophthalmic historians share why they look at the past continued on page 64 About the doctors George Bohigian, MD Professor of clinical ophthalmology Washington University School of Medicine St. Louis Danny H.-Kauffmann Jokl, MD President Cogan Ophthalmic History Society Associate clinical professor of ophthalmology Columbia University Medical Center New York Michael Marmor, MD Professor emeritus of ophthalmology Stanford University School of Medicine Stanford, California "History is part of our heritage and our perspective on what we do. When we lose touch with it, we lose touch with where we've been, the mistakes we should not repeat, what good things we should try to remember." —Michael Marmor, MD

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