Belding scribner biography
Belding Hibbard Scribner
20th-century American physician and pioneer of kidney dialysis
Belding Hibbard Scribner (January 18, &#; June 19, ) was an American physician and a pioneer in kidney dialysis.
Biography
Scribner received his medical degree from Stanford University in After completing his postgraduate studies at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, he joined the faculty of the School of Medicine at the University of Washington in Scribner was married to Ethel Hackett Scribner, and had four children from a previous marriage: Peter, Robert, Thomas and Elizabeth.
In , he, Wayne Quinton, and David Dillard invented a breakthrough device, the Scribner shunt. The device subsequently saved the lives of numerous people with end-stage kidney disease around the globe. The first patient treated was Clyde Shields; due to treatment with the new shunt technique, he survived his chronic kidney failure for more than eleven years, dying in
Scribner's invention created a new problem for clinical practice and a moral dilemma for physicians: Who will be treated if possible treatment is limited? The ethical issues raised by this dilemma are known as the Seattle experience. In , Scribner's presidential address to the American Society for Artificial Internal Organs discussed the problems of patient selection, termination of treatment, patient suicide, death with dignity, and selection for transplantation. This experience with selecting who would receive dialysis is often recognized as the beginning of bioethics.
To provide dialysis on a routine basis outside a research setting, Dr. Scribner turned to the King County Medical Society for sponsorship of a community-supported outpatient dialysis center. James Haviland, then president of the Society, worked to bring Scribner's vision to fruition. As a result, the Seattle Artificial Kidney Center was established in January Eventually renamed Northwest Kidney Centers, it was the world's first outpatient dialysis tre
(January 18, - June 19, )
Born in the United States
Year of Discovery:
Made Long Term Dialysis Possible with His Shunt for Kidney Patients
Belding Scribner was a sickly child. He suffered from serious visual problems, which eventually required corneal transplants. In fact, it was these vision problems that shaped Scribner's medical career. He figured his poor vision would not allow him to practice in a clinical setting, so he instead opted for a career in medical research. This decision has had a profound impact on the lives of millions. Prior to , end-stage kidney failure was a virtual death sentence. Though hemodialysis - the filtration of blood outside the body - was available, it could only be used on a patient a few times, due to the damage it caused to the blood vessels. Scribner changed that. He developed a shunt, made of Teflon, which made it possible for a patient to receive dialysis on an ongoing basis. His invention turned a "death sentence disease" into a disease one can manage, and live with.
Archive June 20, Dr. Belding H. Scribner, professor emeritus of medicine in the University of Washington School of Medicine and an inventor whose device has saved millions of lives, died in Seattle on June 19, , according to the King County Medical Examiner&#;s Office. Scribner, a member of the School of Medicine faculty since , was honored last fall with one of the world&#;s major awards for medicine, the Albert Lasker Award for Clinical Medical Research, in recognition of his pioneering work in kidney dialysis. &#;Although Belding Scribner is internationally renowned for his innovative clinical research, his motivation always came from his role as a physician caring for patients,&#; said Dr. Paul Ramsey, UW vice president for medical affairs and dean of the School of Medicine. &#;Countless people are alive today because of his pioneering innovation. This is a great loss for UW Medicine &#; and for the medical community worldwide.&#; The Lasker Awards are the nation&#;s most distinguished honor for outstanding contributions to basic and clinical medical research. Scribner was honored along with Dr. Willem J. Kolff of the University of Utah. The fate of kidney patients has undergone a revolution in the last half-century, due in large part to Kolff&#;s and Scribner&#;s seminal contributions. Hemodialysis has become a universal standard of care for individuals with acute and chronic kidney failure. Furthermore, it is the first &#; and still the only &#; method in which a machine replaces a failed internal organ. In the late s, Scribner encountered a gravely ill patient who was receiving short-term dialysis with an artificial kidney. The patient responded unusually well, and within three days, he was walking along the hospital corridors. But the cure was temporary because it turned out that he had permanent kidney damage. Despite the amazing recovery, he died soon afterward. Several weeks later, Scribner woke Belding H. Scribner, or “Scrib” to his many friends across the world, died after a fall from his houseboat in Seattle on June 19, With his passing, nephrology lost not only one of its true giants but a colleague of extraordinary gentleness, humility, and integrity who made unsurpassed contributions to our field. In , Dr. Scribner, working with Wayne Quinton and David Dillard, perfected the Scribner shunt, a Teflon device that allowed patients for the first time to be connected repeatedly to hemodialysis machines thereby launching the era of modern renal replacement therapy as well as the clinical discipline of nephrology as we now know it. For that accomplishment, Dr. Scribner shared with Willem Kolff the Albert Lasker Award for Clinical Medical Research, considered the American equivalent of the Nobel Prize, for “the development of renal dialysis, which changed kidney failure from a fatal to a treatable disease, prolonging the lives of millions of patients”[J Am Soc Nephrol –, ]. Belding Scribner was born January 18, in Chicago and attended Williams College, the University of California at Berkeley, and Stanford University School of Medicine, where he received his M.D. in At Stanford he fell under the mentorship of Dr. Thomas Addis who first introduced him to the challenges of kidney disease. He completed a residency in internal medicine at the San Francisco General Hospital followed by a fellowship in medicine at the Mayo Clinic. While at the Mayo Clinic, Dr. Scribner first heard of the experience with the Kolff-Brigham rotating drum artificial kidney from a lecture by John Merrill. Recruited to Seattle by the legendary Robert Williams, he joined the faculty at the University of Washington in and became the first Head of the Division of Nephrology at that institution in , a position he held for 24 years. He became an Emeritus Professor of Medicine at the University of Washington in and held the Belding H. Scribner Endowed Chair in Med
The kidneys are fist-sized organs that are shaped like beans, located just below the rib cage toward the middle of the back. Though fairly small, the kidneys are powerful workhorses. Each day the kidneys filter about quarts of blood to remove the impurities. These impurities, which add up to around 2 quarts per day, are then excreted in the urine. In addition to filtering out waste materials and excess water, the kidneys also process vital minerals such as potassium and sodium, and send them back to the body in appropriate amounts. This complicated filtering process takes place within the nephrons, which are tiny units that contain specialized blood vessels. Each kidney contains about one million nephrons, and when the nephrons lose their ability to filter blood, the result is what we call kidney failure. Early stages of kidney failure may produce lethargy, shortness of breath, and weakness. Swelling may occur, as the body loses its a UW mourns loss of Dr. Belding H. Scribner
Belding H. Scribner