Pott's disease historical perspective

Editor-In-Chief: C. Michael Gibson, M.S., M.D. [1] Associate Editor(s)-in-Chief: Aravind Kuchkuntla, M.B.B.S [2]

Overview

Pott’s disease is named after Percivall Pott (1714–1788), a London surgeon who trained at St Bartholomew’s Hospital, London.

Historical Perspective

Spinal Tuberculosis is one of the oldest disease and was found in bone samples from five Iron age individuals recovered from a cemetry in Aymyrlyg, South Siberia. The spine lesions demonstrated a positive DNA PCR amplification for mycobacterium bovis, this shows that the infection was present 2000 years ago.^[1]
In 1779, Sir Percival Pott described the classic features of spinal tuberculosis: destruction of the intervertebral discs, body of the vertebra resulting in progressive kyphosis and named the disease Pott’s disease.^[2]

References

↑ Taylor GM, Murphy E, Hopkins R, Rutland P, Chistov Y (2007). “First report of Mycobacterium bovis DNA in human remains from the Iron Age”. Microbiology. 153 (Pt 4): 1243–9. doi:10.1099/mic.0.2006/002154-0. PMID 17379733.
↑ Dobson J (1972). “Percivall Pott”. Ann R Coll Surg Engl. 50 (1): 54–65. PMC 2388056. PMID 4550865.

Overview