BROUSSAIS, FRANOIS-JOSEPH-VICTOR

born Dec. 17, 1772, Saint-Malo, Fr. died Nov. 17, 1838, Paris French physician whose advocacy of bleeding, leech treatments, and fasting dominated Parisian medical practice early in the 19th century. Following publication of L'Examen des doctrines mdicales (1816; The Examination of Medical Doctrines), Broussais' system of physiological medicine rapidly became the most popular medical philosophy around Paris. His doctrine insisted that all disease originates as an irritation of the gastrointestinal tract that passes to other organs sympathetically. Broussais is one of history's most notorious bleeders. His methods fell into disfavour, however, when his treatment of victims of the 1832 Paris cholera epidemic ended disastrously.