Page:A cyclopedia of American medical biography vol. 2.djvu/82

 KEYT

66

KIDDER

stock — a descendant of Edward Penn, of Pennsylvania. A few years after his birth his father removed to Mos- cow, Ohio. The boy was educated in Parker's Academy in Felicity, Ohio, and in 1S45 he began to study medicine with Dr. ^\illiam Johnston, of IMos- cow, matriculating at the Medical College, Ohio, in 18-47.

He had his M. D. in March, 1848, and in 1849 practised at Moscow, Ohio, but in 1850 removed to Walnut Hills, Cincinnati, where he remained until the end of his life, November 9, 1885.

In manner he was sedate, almost grave, slow and deliberate in action, in accord- ance mth the Dutch blood coursing in his veins. He crossed swords, in a lively journal controversy concerning the ex- pediency of creating a vesico-vaginal fistula for cystitis, with the late Prof. Parvin, a master in dialectics and phraseology. The latter had no ad- vantage in style, of expression or cogency of reasoning, although the operation he contended for has become an established one.

In 1873 Dr. Keyt's attention was attracted to the consideration of the graphic method in the portrayal of the movements of the circulation. First, experimentation was commenced with M. Mavy's spring instrument, but it did not take long to discover that the spring did not furnish all the undulations of the blood-column to the slide. To elucidate the prob- lems of the circulation a double instru- ment was required — one that would take two tracings, the heart and an artery, or two arteries, the one above the other, upon the slide, with a chro- nographic trace below, so that the time could be recorded and the difference in time between the two tracings be computed. Such a mechanism Dr. Keyt devised, a cardiograph and sphygmograph combined, which he termed the compound sphygmograph. This invention has stood the test of time and is today the best adapted

for its purpose of any that have been produced.

A scheme was arranged, by means of which lesions of the mitral and aortic cardiac orifices were represented, and their relations to pulse wave ve- locity. The developments were record- ed by the compound sphygmograph, and the results secured have been con- firmed by graphic tracings of clinical cases. These experimental researches formed the basis of a series of articles in the "Journal of the American Med- ical Association" for 1883.

His book " Sphygmography and Cardiography," is an enduring monu- ment to his industry and genius. Between its covers is included more of patient, painstaking effort than is rarely presented to the professon in equal volume.

To him is due the discovery that an abnormal delay of the pulse-wave follows upon mitral regurgitation. The value of this revelation to the practical physician is obvious.

On October 10, 1848, Dr. Keyt married Miss Susannah D. Hamlin of Cincinnati and had seven children.

Dr. Keyt died suddenly November 9, 1885, at Cincinnati, from rupture of a cerebral artery.

His principal WTitings are included in " Sphygmography and Cardiography," New York, 1887. A. B. I.

Phila. Month. Med. Jour., vol. i, 1889 (A. B.

Isham).

There is an oil painting owned by Mrs. Mary

H. Isham.

Kidder, Jerome Henry (1842-1889),

He was born in Baltimore County, Maryland, where he spent his boy- hood days, then entered Harvard Col- lege at the age of sixteen and was graduated bachelor of arts in 1862. He was appointed a medical cadet during the war, and the study of med- icine, begun at that time, was continued in Baltimore, and in 1866 he received the degree of doctor of medicine from the University of Maryland. Shortly