Edward Bright Vedder
Encyclopedia
Dr Edward Bright Vedder (1878–1952) was a U.S. Army
physician, a noted researcher on deficiency diseases, and a medical educator. He studied beriberi
, a deficiency disease affecting the peripheral nerves, establishing an extract of rice
bran
as its proper treatment.
to Henry Clay Vedder, a Baptist
clergyman, and Minnie Lingham Vedder. He was educated at the University of Rochester
(Ph.B., 1898) and the University of Pennsylvania
(M.D., 1902 and M.S., 1903). At Penn he did research on dysentery
with Simon Flexner
.
In 1903, he was commissioned an officer in the U.S. Army Medical Corps
, and continued his studies at the Army Medical School
(AMS) in Washington, D.C., graduating the next year.
He then served in the Philippines
, where he saw and studied tropical diseases (especially beriberi and scurvy
). U.S. Army medical officers were conducting much research into the possible causes of beriberi, initially using animal subjects. Vedder became convinced by the work of Christiaan Rijkman and Gerrit Grijns and others that beri-beri was indeed caused by a nutritional deficiency. He enlisted the help of Robert R. Williams
of the Bureau of Science in Manila
in isolating the "anti-beri-beri factor". In 1911, Vedder and Maj. Weston P. Chamberlain, who had become members of the Tropical Disease Board in 1910, began experimenting with the treatment of infantile beriberi with an extract of rice polishings (or partially milled rice, an alcohol-based extract of rice hulls). Williams set out to isolate the ingredient responsible, but his work was deferred with a career change to chemistry for Bell Telephone Company
. Other physicians had already tried feeding the polishings to nursing mothers. Believing the problem to be a poison in the mother's milk, they required that each baby be exclusively bottle-fed until the mother's treatment had been completed. Vedder and Chamberlain cured 15 infants whose mothers had symptoms of beriberi by supplementing each mother's milk with an extract of rice polishings and allowing nursing to continue. In every case, regardless of the seriousness of the baby's condition, the cure was rapid and complete. The experiment demonstrated conclusively that beriberi was a deficiency disease rather than the result of a toxin in the mother's milk. In 1913 Vedder published a seminal book on the subject. (As an aside, work slowdown during the Great Depression
allowed Williams to return to beri-beri research, and it was not until 1933 when he successfully isolated its vitamin preventative in quantity. In 1936 he first synthesized it and named it thiamine
– vitamin B1 having been its original designation.)
Vedder returned (1913) to the United States and was appointed assistant professor of pathology at the AMS. He also undertook research on scurvy that helped lead others to the discovery that ascorbic acid
is a vitamin
. He discovered that emetine
, the active ingredient of the ancient emetic ipecacuanha, is an amoebicide and therefore effective against amoebic dysentery
. He also did research on leprosy
, syphilis
, dysentery
, and whooping cough. He became director (1919) of the Southern Department Laboratory at Fort Sam Houston
, Texas and later chief of medical research (1922–25) at the Edgewood Arsenal in Maryland
.
In 1925, Vedder returned to Manila as senior member of the Army Board for Medical Research. Four years later, he returned to Washington and in the following year assumed command of the AMS (now called the Army Medical Center).
After his retirement from the Army in 1933 he became professor of experimental medicine at George Washington University
. In 1942 he was appointed Director of Medical Education at the Alameda County Hospital (California
) and laboratory director of the Highland County Hospital (Oakland), posts that he retained until his retirement in 1947.
United States Army
The United States Army is the main branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. It is the largest and oldest established branch of the U.S. military, and is one of seven U.S. uniformed services...
physician, a noted researcher on deficiency diseases, and a medical educator. He studied beriberi
Beriberi
Beriberi is a nervous system ailment caused by a thiamine deficiency in the diet. Thiamine is involved in the breakdown of energy molecules such as glucose and is also found on the membranes of neurons...
, a deficiency disease affecting the peripheral nerves, establishing an extract of rice
Rice
Rice is the seed of the monocot plants Oryza sativa or Oryza glaberrima . As a cereal grain, it is the most important staple food for a large part of the world's human population, especially in East Asia, Southeast Asia, South Asia, the Middle East, and the West Indies...
bran
Bran
Bran is the hard outer layer of grain and consists of combined aleurone and pericarp. Along with germ, it is an integral part of whole grains, and is often produced as a by-product of milling in the production of refined grains. When bran is removed from grains, the grains lose a portion of their...
as its proper treatment.
Biography
Vedder was born in New York CityNew York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
to Henry Clay Vedder, a Baptist
Baptist
Baptists comprise a group of Christian denominations and churches that subscribe to a doctrine that baptism should be performed only for professing believers , and that it must be done by immersion...
clergyman, and Minnie Lingham Vedder. He was educated at the University of Rochester
University of Rochester
The University of Rochester is a private, nonsectarian, research university in Rochester, New York, United States. The university grants undergraduate and graduate degrees, including doctoral and professional degrees. The university has six schools and various interdisciplinary programs.The...
(Ph.B., 1898) and the University of Pennsylvania
University of Pennsylvania
The University of Pennsylvania is a private, Ivy League university located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Penn is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States,Penn is the fourth-oldest using the founding dates claimed by each institution...
(M.D., 1902 and M.S., 1903). At Penn he did research on dysentery
Dysentery
Dysentery is an inflammatory disorder of the intestine, especially of the colon, that results in severe diarrhea containing mucus and/or blood in the faeces with fever and abdominal pain. If left untreated, dysentery can be fatal.There are differences between dysentery and normal bloody diarrhoea...
with Simon Flexner
Simon Flexner
Simon Flexner, M.D. was a physician, scientist, administrator, and professor of experimental pathology at the University of Pennsylvania . He was the first director of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research and a trustee of the Rockefeller Foundation...
.
In 1903, he was commissioned an officer in the U.S. Army Medical Corps
Medical Corps (United States Army)
The Medical Corps of the U.S. Army is a staff corps of the U.S. Army Medical Department consisting of commissioned medical officers – physicians with either an MD or a DO degree, at least one year of post-graduate clinical training, and a state medical license.The MC traces its earliest origins...
, and continued his studies at the Army Medical School
Army Medical School
Founded by U.S. Army Brigadier General George Miller Sternberg, MD in 1893, the Army Medical School was by some reckonings the world's first school of public health and preventive medicine...
(AMS) in Washington, D.C., graduating the next year.
He then served in the Philippines
Philippines
The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...
, where he saw and studied tropical diseases (especially beriberi and scurvy
Scurvy
Scurvy is a disease resulting from a deficiency of vitamin C, which is required for the synthesis of collagen in humans. The chemical name for vitamin C, ascorbic acid, is derived from the Latin name of scurvy, scorbutus, which also provides the adjective scorbutic...
). U.S. Army medical officers were conducting much research into the possible causes of beriberi, initially using animal subjects. Vedder became convinced by the work of Christiaan Rijkman and Gerrit Grijns and others that beri-beri was indeed caused by a nutritional deficiency. He enlisted the help of Robert R. Williams
Robert R. Williams
Robert Runnels Williams was an American chemist, known for being the first to synthesize thiamine . He first isolated thiamine in 1933, and synthesized vitamin B in 1935. Among his awards were the Elliott Cresson Medal in 1940 and the Perkin Medal in 1947.-Life:He was born in Nellore, India to...
of the Bureau of Science in Manila
Manila
Manila is the capital of the Philippines. It is one of the sixteen cities forming Metro Manila.Manila is located on the eastern shores of Manila Bay and is bordered by Navotas and Caloocan to the north, Quezon City to the northeast, San Juan and Mandaluyong to the east, Makati on the southeast,...
in isolating the "anti-beri-beri factor". In 1911, Vedder and Maj. Weston P. Chamberlain, who had become members of the Tropical Disease Board in 1910, began experimenting with the treatment of infantile beriberi with an extract of rice polishings (or partially milled rice, an alcohol-based extract of rice hulls). Williams set out to isolate the ingredient responsible, but his work was deferred with a career change to chemistry for Bell Telephone Company
Bell Telephone Company
The Bell Telephone Company, a common law joint stock company, was organized in Boston, Massachusetts on July 9, 1877 by Alexander Graham Bell's father-in-law Gardiner Greene Hubbard, who also helped organize a sister company — the New England Telephone and Telegraph Company...
. Other physicians had already tried feeding the polishings to nursing mothers. Believing the problem to be a poison in the mother's milk, they required that each baby be exclusively bottle-fed until the mother's treatment had been completed. Vedder and Chamberlain cured 15 infants whose mothers had symptoms of beriberi by supplementing each mother's milk with an extract of rice polishings and allowing nursing to continue. In every case, regardless of the seriousness of the baby's condition, the cure was rapid and complete. The experiment demonstrated conclusively that beriberi was a deficiency disease rather than the result of a toxin in the mother's milk. In 1913 Vedder published a seminal book on the subject. (As an aside, work slowdown during the Great Depression
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
allowed Williams to return to beri-beri research, and it was not until 1933 when he successfully isolated its vitamin preventative in quantity. In 1936 he first synthesized it and named it thiamine
Thiamine
Thiamine or thiamin or vitamin B1 , named as the "thio-vitamine" is a water-soluble vitamin of the B complex. First named aneurin for the detrimental neurological effects if not present in the diet, it was eventually assigned the generic descriptor name vitamin B1. Its phosphate derivatives are...
– vitamin B1 having been its original designation.)
Vedder returned (1913) to the United States and was appointed assistant professor of pathology at the AMS. He also undertook research on scurvy that helped lead others to the discovery that ascorbic acid
Ascorbic acid
Ascorbic acid is a naturally occurring organic compound with antioxidant properties. It is a white solid, but impure samples can appear yellowish. It dissolves well in water to give mildly acidic solutions. Ascorbic acid is one form of vitamin C. The name is derived from a- and scorbutus , the...
is a vitamin
Vitamin
A vitamin is an organic compound required as a nutrient in tiny amounts by an organism. In other words, an organic chemical compound is called a vitamin when it cannot be synthesized in sufficient quantities by an organism, and must be obtained from the diet. Thus, the term is conditional both on...
. He discovered that emetine
Emetine
Emetine is a drug used as both an anti-protozoal and to induce vomiting. It is produced from the ipecac root.-Early emetine-based preparations:Early use of emetine was in the form of oral administration of the extract of ipecac root, or ipecacuanha...
, the active ingredient of the ancient emetic ipecacuanha, is an amoebicide and therefore effective against amoebic dysentery
Amoebic dysentery
Amoebic dysentery is a type of dysentery caused primarily by the amoeba Entamoeba histolytica. Amoebic dysentery is transmitted through contaminated food and water. Amoebae spread by forming infective cysts which can be found in stools, and spread if whoever touches them does not sanitize their...
. He also did research on leprosy
Leprosy
Leprosy or Hansen's disease is a chronic disease caused by the bacteria Mycobacterium leprae and Mycobacterium lepromatosis. Named after physician Gerhard Armauer Hansen, leprosy is primarily a granulomatous disease of the peripheral nerves and mucosa of the upper respiratory tract; skin lesions...
, syphilis
Syphilis
Syphilis is a sexually transmitted infection caused by the spirochete bacterium Treponema pallidum subspecies pallidum. The primary route of transmission is through sexual contact; however, it may also be transmitted from mother to fetus during pregnancy or at birth, resulting in congenital syphilis...
, dysentery
Dysentery
Dysentery is an inflammatory disorder of the intestine, especially of the colon, that results in severe diarrhea containing mucus and/or blood in the faeces with fever and abdominal pain. If left untreated, dysentery can be fatal.There are differences between dysentery and normal bloody diarrhoea...
, and whooping cough. He became director (1919) of the Southern Department Laboratory at Fort Sam Houston
Fort Sam Houston
Fort Sam Houston is a U.S. Army post in San Antonio, Texas.Known colloquially as "Fort Sam," it is named for the first President of the Republic of Texas, Sam Houston....
, Texas and later chief of medical research (1922–25) at the Edgewood Arsenal in Maryland
Maryland
Maryland is a U.S. state located in the Mid Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware to its east...
.
In 1925, Vedder returned to Manila as senior member of the Army Board for Medical Research. Four years later, he returned to Washington and in the following year assumed command of the AMS (now called the Army Medical Center).
After his retirement from the Army in 1933 he became professor of experimental medicine at George Washington University
George Washington University
The George Washington University is a private, coeducational comprehensive university located in Washington, D.C. in the United States...
. In 1942 he was appointed Director of Medical Education at the Alameda County Hospital (California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
) and laboratory director of the Highland County Hospital (Oakland), posts that he retained until his retirement in 1947.
Legacy
- The North Pavilion or "Vedder Pavilion" of Building 40 on the campus of the Walter Reed Army Medical CenterWalter Reed Army Medical CenterThe Walter Reed Army Medical Center was the United States Army's flagship medical center until 2011. Located on 113 acres in Washington, D.C., it served more than 150,000 active and retired personnel from all branches of the military...
is named for him. - An essay written by Lt Col Nathan Johnson about the scientific accomplishments of Dr. Vedder won the 2006 AMSUS history of medicine essay award.
Selected works
- Vedder, E.B., Beriberi, New York: William Wood and Company (1913), his best known monograph
- Vedder, E.B., The Medical Aspects of Chemical Warfare (1925)
- Vedder, E.B., The Pathology of Beriberi, JAMAJournal of the American Medical AssociationThe Journal of the American Medical Association is a weekly, peer-reviewed, medical journal, published by the American Medical Association. Beginning in July 2011, the editor in chief will be Howard C. Bauchner, vice chairman of pediatrics at Boston University’s School of Medicine, replacing ...
110 (1938), pp. 893–896.
See also
- Beri-beri
- Army Medical SchoolArmy Medical SchoolFounded by U.S. Army Brigadier General George Miller Sternberg, MD in 1893, the Army Medical School was by some reckonings the world's first school of public health and preventive medicine...
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- List of kalanchoe diseases