[Menière and his disease]

Prosper Menière (1799-1862) was born in Angers, where his father was a merchant. He finished his medical studies in Paris and subsequently became an assistant at the Hôtel Dieu, first to the surgeon Dupuytren and later to the internist Chomel. Meanwhile he helped to combat an epidemic of cholera in the south of France, and he was personal physician to the imprisoned Duchess de Berry, who had returned from exile to reclaim the throne for the Bourbon dynasty. In 1838 he specialised in otology after he had been made head of the Institute for Deaf Mutes in Paris. In 1861 he described a group of patients who suffered recurrent attacks of vertigo as well as abnormal sounds and whose hearing deteriorated over the years. He attributed this condition to a disorder of the inner ear; this went against the prevailing opinion, which attributed most vertiginous attacks to cerebral congestion.