Lester Dragstedt

Early life and education

Lester Reynold Dragstedt was born in Anaconda, Montana to Swedish emigrant parents. His younger brother, Carl Albert, also became a doctor and surgeon. In his youth, his father encouraged him to memorize poetry including Bible passages and fragments of famous speeches. He was valedictorian of his high school and was offered a scholarship to schools including the University of Chicago. Swedish physiologist Anton Julius Carlson was a long-time friend of the Dragstedts who was the local Lutheran minister but started teaching physiology at the University of Chicago and encouraged the Dragstedts to "send the boy to Chicago. They will found out in three months if he has any brains, and if he does not, you can bring him back to Anaconda and put him to work in the copper smelter". In the beginning, Dragstedt thought of becoming a physicist after hearing lectures by Robert Andrews Millikan but was later influenced by physicians Ivan Pavlov and Michel Latarjet. However, he was especially influenced by A. J. Carlson, whom he would consider a mentor and advisor throughout his career, and Dragstedt pursued his studies of physiology. Dragstedt became a talented operating surgeon after practicing with animals and was attracted to surgery but he felt physiology had "greater promise for innovative accomplishments".

He primarily studied at the University of Chicago, where he received his Bachelor of Science degree in 1915, Masters of Physiology in 1916, Ph.D of Physiology in 1920 and finally Doctor of Medicine the following year. In 1918, he met Gladys Shoesmith, a student at Iowa and later married her in 1922. In 1916, he started as a physiologist and instructor of pharmacology at University of Iowa before returning in 1919, after serving in the military during World War I. While at University of Chicago, he briefly worked as a teacher at Northwestern University in 1923.

In 1925, as a Rockefeller Fellow, Dragstedt traveled abroad where his daughter Charlotte was born; his travels included to Paris to study at Fritz de Quervain's clinic and Vienna with Anton Eiselsberg and at Vienna General Hospital with Jakob Erdheim and finally to Budapest with Eugen Pólya and at St. Rochus Hospital with Hümer Hültl. He paid each teacher $150 a month and returned to the United States where he was recruited in 1926 by Dallas B. Phemister to help design new research facilities for University of Chicago. After this, he was promoted to associate professor of surgery, eventually replacing Phemister as chair in 1947 and holding this position until his retirement in 1959 when he became professor emeritus.

Military training and health issues

In a 1971 letter, Dragstedt spoke of his time in the military, saying he went to Washington, D. C. after leaving Iowa to study typhoid vaccines at Army Medical School with Edward Bright Vedder. After growing tired of his activities, he transferred to Fort Leavenworth and subsequently to Yale with Milton Winternitz and then Camp Merritt which he called "my best experience in the Army" as he would perform autopsies from morning to night for about eight months. However, he contracted tuberculosis and spent nine months at a tuberculosis sanatorium in Arizona and later had a urinary tract examination. Surgeon Herman Kretschmer found that Dragstedt had a unilateral tuberculosis kidney which required a nephrectomy and Kretschmer and Dragstedt's brother Carl performed the surgery. In 1927, Dragstedt also survived a severe bout of typhoid fever which caused him to lose 50 pounds (23 kg). He was also hard of hearing throughout his life.

Career

In 1936, he was one of three doctors from the University of Chicago's Department of Bacteriology, Surgery and Medicine who discovered a new germ, the apparent cause of ulcerative colitis.

He was particularly recognized for his contributions to the treatment of the pancreas, parathyroids and diseases of the stomach. He originated the skin-grafted ileostomy in the treatment of ulcerative colitis.

He developed a new surgical procedure (surgical vagotomy) for duodenal ulcers (resulting from peptic ulcer disease). He was a well-respected surgeon, renowned for his work on gastric and duodenal ulcers and his work was documented in over 360 articles published in several medical journals.

In 1950, he and his team at the University of Chicago discovered a new organ in the stomach, the antrum, which may play an important role in causing ulcers. The gastrin and stomach's secretions stimulate the flow of gastric juices and cause the stomach "digest" itself, causing the ulcers. The team discovered this while working with dogs and published their findings in the Society for Experimental Biology. They found that removal of the antrum noticeably reduced the flow of gastric juices. That same year, while at the University of Chicago, Dragstedt managed a program where music was mixed with anesthesia to help calm patients.

He considered his vagotomy surgical technique "the most important contribution of his career". In a 1971 news interview, he revealed that he always believed "knowledge was the most important legacy one generation could bequeath to the next", and when he once asked his classmates how long Earth would remain inhabitable and they responded two billion years, he chose teaching as his profession.

Following his Chicago retirement, he moved to Florida where he became a full-time physiology and research professor at University of Florida College of Medicine until his death of a heart attack in 1975 at his lake house near Elk Lake, Michigan. He was also a president of National Society for Medical Research. From 1964 to 1965, he was also a visiting professor at Marquette University Medical School (now Medical College of Wisconsin). His wife, Gladys, died two years after him and they are survived by their children: Charlotte, Carol, Lester R. II, also a surgeon in Iowa, and John Albert.

Legacy

Since 1977, the UF College of Medicine Department of Surgery have held annual Lester R. Dragstedt Symposiums, named in his honour. The award "Lester R. Dragstedt Physician Scientist Award" was also named for him.

Honors and Distinctions

Degrees

Honorary Degrees

Career

University Appointments

Membership of Organizations and Societies

American Organizations and Societies

Honorary Memberships in Foreign Organizations and Societies

Honors and awards

American Honors and Awards

Foreign Honors and Awards