Carl Siegmund Franz Credé

Carl Siegmund Franz Credé

Carl Siegmund Franz Credé (23 December 1819 – 14 March 1892) was a German gynecologist and obstetrician born in Berlin.

In 1842 he received his doctorate from the University of Berlin. In 1852 he became director of the "Berlin School of Midwives" and chief physician of the maternity division at the Berlin Charité. Later he was appointed professor of obstetrics and director of the maternity hospital in Leipzig. In Berlin and Leipzig, Credé established out-patient gynecology clinics. He was the father of surgeon Benno Credé (1847–1929) and a father-in-law to gynecologist Christian Gerhard Leopold (1846–1912). Among his better known students at Leipzig was gynecologist Johann Friedrich Ahlfeld (1843–1929).

Carl Credé is famous for introducing the use of silver nitrate eyedrops as an antiseptic for the prevention of ophthalmia neonatorum in newborns. He used a 2% silver nitrate solution, and first demonstrated its effectiveness in the early 1880s. During a three-year period, Credé treated 1160 newborns with silver nitrate, with only 0.15% of the infants developing ophthalmia. The silver nitrate solution is sometimes referred to as "Credé's prophylaxis" in medical literature. Later, the solution was diluted to 1% silver nitrate, and became a standard practice in obstetrics.

Credé is also credited for implementing a procedure to hasten delivery of the placenta; it being named Credé's manoeuvre. From 1853 to 1869, he edited the "Monatsschrift für Geburtskunde", and from 1870 onward, was an editor of the "Archiv für Gynäkologie".

Selected works

• Klinische Vorträge über Geburtshilfe, two volumes, Berlin, 1853-1854 – Clinical lectures on midwifery.
• Ueber Erwärmungsgeräthe für frühgeborene und schwächliche kleine Kinder, (a treatise on warming devices for prematures and feeble tiny children) Mittheilungen aus der geburtshüflichen Klinik in Leipzig. "Archiv für Gynäkologie", 1884, 24: 128–147.
• Die Verhütung der Augenentzündung der Neugeborenen. 1884 – The prevention of ophthalmia of the newborn.

• Health and Medical Biographies (biography of Carl Siegmund Franz Credé)