[Duchenne de Boulogne: Pioneer of Neurology]

Guillaume-Benjamin-Amand Duchenne de Boulogne once remarked that he found neurology "a sprawling infant of unknown parentage, which he succored to lusty youth." He was born in the Boulogne-sur-Mer region of France in1806. He studied medicine in Paris from 1826 to 1831 and later established a practice in Boulogne. In 1835, he observed isolated muscular contractions produced by electropuncture and began investigating the electrical excitation of muscle. In 1842, he left Boulogne for Paris to continue medical research, often visiting hospitals with his electrical equipment to examine unusual cases. He was an inventive investigator who developed several technical innovations, including electrodiagnosis, electrotherapy, needle muscle biopsy, and medical photography. He enumerated his major discoveries in "L'Electrisation Localisee," which included descriptions of progressive muscular atrophy (now called spinal muscular atrophy), atrophic paralysis of childhood (poliomyelitis), progressive locomotor ataxia (tabes dorsalis), glosso-labio-laryngeal paralysis (progressive bulbar palsy), and pseudohypertrophic paralysis (Duchenne muscular dystrophy). Based on Duchenne's intensive investigations, Jean-Martin Charcot refined his medical concepts and established nosological disease entities, calling Duchenne "mon maître en neurologie" (my master in neurology). Duchenne never held a hospital or university position. He died of cerebrovascular disease on September 17, 1875.