Francesco Durante (29 June 1844 – 2 October 1934) was an Italian politician and surgeon. He was the first to perform a brain surgery in 1884 in Rome.
Biography
Childhood
Francesco Durante was born in Letojanni on 29 June 1844 to Giovanna Giuseppa Galeano and Domenico Durante.
His father was elected mayor of Letojanni (from March 1880 to May 1884) and transferred the administrative seat of the municipality from Gallodoro to the small seaside village of Letojanni. After the death of his mother Giovanna Giuseppa Galeano, Francesco’s father entrusted him to the care of a religious tutor of Taormina Don di Blasi who directed him in the choice of studies.
Formation
From Taormina he moved to Messina where he completed the humanistic preparation always under the guidance of the elderly priest. In the Peloritan city he matured the decision to enroll in the Faculty of Medicine of Naples where he successfully graduated on January 7, 1868. Soon after that, Francesco Durante explained to his father the need to attend the most prestigious European centres, both in terms of research and clinical activity. This need to confront other realities represents an important moment in the training of the young doctor.
During a call for tenders related to the recruitment of a surgeon at the Santa Maria Nuova hospital in Florence, passed the test and immediately began to work. His activity soon stopped, because he was offered the opportunity to attend, by means of a scholarship, the laboratory of pathological anatomy of the great Rudolf Virchow. Before reaching Berlin he attended Theodore Billroth’s surgery school; at that time he was considered the best surgeon of the digestive system (Billroth II). Durante had the opportunity to learn advanced techniques and improve them in order to share his knowledge with his students. Teaching will be the main goal, which he will practice for almost fifty years.
First achievements in the medical field
The innate curiosity, the prestigious location in which he was located and the daily interviews he had with the greatest expert in oncology of the time, certainly influenced the formulation of the "Embryogenetic Theory of Tumours", which from there to a few years will be an exciting moment for the young researcher, who had already returned to Italy and who will see his fame grow, overcoming national borders. The theory, which took the name of Cohnheim-Durante, was in fact formulated more than a year before his opponent. Cohnheim was a pupil of Virchow in Berlin as well, but they actually never met.
This theory is based on the hypothesis that point and random alterations of nuclear DNA would give rise to tumour clones capable of growing and metastasizing at any time. Recently, the Cohnheim–Durante Theory has been revived in the light of the revaluation of stem cells.
He left the Institute of Pathological Anatomy of Berlin, taking advantage of the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War, in which he participated as head of the German Red Cross. On that occasion a Prussian frontline soldier had an impressive haemorrhage from the rupture of the subclavian vein. Taking the patient to the rear would have been too risky and valuable time would have been wasted. Durante decides to run to the front in no man's land with the risk of being hit by the opposing fire, he manages to block the bleeding and attach the stumps of the interrupted vase. For this gesture, when the Prussian ambassador reaches Paris, he seeks Durante, to award him an honour on behalf of the King of Prussia, but does not find him. Through diplomatic channels, his father Domenico is reached who, unaware of what happened, tracks down his son asking:
"Francesco, what have you done?" And he proudly replied, "Dad nothing you should be ashamed of."
He later attended surgery classes held in London by W. Ferguson and T. Spencer, but this stay lasts little and he observes that the sterilization of the surgical instruments takes place by boiling or by the use of dry stoves. His European experience, throughout various prestigious research institutes and clinics certainly contributed to the completion Durante's medical training.