Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/195

NAME BURNETT 173 BURNETT was elected a second time to this office in the rejuvenated society, in 1786, he delivered the first "Dissertation" to be published in the So- ciety's Transactions "On the origin, antiquity, dignity and usefulness of the Science of Med- icine, and the qualifications necessary for a ijractitioner of the same." Dr. Burnet died October 7, 1791, aged sixty. Hist, of Medicine in New Jersey and of its Medi- cal men up to 1800, Stephen Wickes, A.M., M.D., Newark, 1879. Trans. New Jersey Medical Society, i, 1766-1858. Medical Men of the Revolution, J. M. Toner, Phila., 1876. Burnett, Charles Henry (1842-1902) Charles Henry Burnett, otologist, was born in Philadelphia on May 28, 184-2. After educa- tion in the schools of his native city he en- tered Yale in 1860 and graduated in 1864. After graduating from Yale he entered the University of Pennsylvania, receiving the M.D. in March, 1867. He was soon after ap- pointed resident physician in the Episcopal Hospital of Philadelphia, serving a full term in that capacity. Upon the completion of this service he went abroad, spending ten months in the laboratories and hospitals of Europe during the years 1868-69. Upon returning to Philadelphia he practised medicine for a year. He had always had his attention strongly attracted to the study of otology, and at length decided to return to Europe and devote him- self to a special study of that subject. In the pursuit of this design he gave up his practice in 1870 and went abroad, where he worked for over a year, especially in the laboratories of Helmholtz and Virchow, and in the clinic of Politzer. These three eminent men became greatly attached to the American student, and in subsequent years their friendship was con- tinued. With Helmholtz, in particular, he es- tablished most cordial relations, conducting in his laboratory his invaluable series of investi- gations into the condition of the membrane of the round window during the movements of the auditory ossicles and upon the various ef- fects of changes in intralabyrinthine pressure. This research work of Dr. Burnett placed him at once among the most eminent investigators into the physiology of hearing. He returned to Philadelphia in April, 1872, and took up practice once more, devoting his ■work solely to diseases of the ear. He never enjoyed robust health, and his un- flagging industry was often a source of anx- iety and wonder to his friends who knew how severe a physical strain it must have been for him to bear. In spite of the arduous labor involved in his attention to his practice Dr. Burnett nev- er ceased to pursue his investigations into the scientific side of the specialty of otology. Of literary work of large scope I mention particularly his "Treatise on Diseases of the Ear," published in 1877; "Hearing, and Hovir to Keep It," one of the American Health Pri- mers published in 1879; "The System of Dis- eases of the Ear, Nose, and Throat," edited by him in 1893; the chapters of otology in the "American Text-book of Surgery," 1896, in the "Encyclopaedia of Diseases of Chil- dren," edited by Keating, and in the "Ameri- can Year-book of Medicine and Surgery." For many years Dr. Burnett edited the department of progress of otology in the American Jour- nal of the Medical Sciences, and the author can bear personal testimony to the diligence and assiduity with which he labored. Of the many positions which he held the following may be regarded as the most impor- tant. In 1882 he was elected professor of diseases of the ear in the Philadelphia Polyclinic Hospital and College for Graduates in Medi- cine, and later emeritus professor of the in- stitution. At various times he was clinical professor of otologj- in the Woman's Medical College ; aural surgeon to the Presbyterian Hospital ; consulting aurist to the Pennsylva- nia Institution for Deaf and Dumb ; to St. Timothy's Hospital ; to the West Philadelphia Hospital for Women; to the Philadelphia Hospital for Epileptics. Among his contemporaries in the profession. Dr. Burnett enjoyed a wide circle of friends ; his kindly disposition and warm heart held by his side many who, in the daily rush and hur- ry of their labors, were unable to hold as much intercourse with him as they wished. But a few months before his death. Dr. Burnett published, in collaboration with Drs. E. Fletcher Ingals (q.v.), of Chicago, and James E. Newcomb, of New York, a "Text- book of Diseases of the Ear, Nose and Throat," which may be regarded as the most advanced work of its character in the English language. The last literary work of Dr. Bur- nett, aside from this book, was an article on "Scarlatinous Empyema of the Superior Squa- momastoid Cells," which appeared in the American Journal of the Medical Sciences for March, 1902, after its author had passed away. He attended the meeting of the section of otol- ogy and laryngology of the College of Physi- cians of Philadelphia on the evening of Wed- nesday, January IS, and took an active part in the discussion of the papers read upon that oc-