32 Facts About Mihran Kassabian

Mihran Krikor Kassabian was an Armenian-American physician, one of the early investigators into the medical uses of X-rays, and a faculty member at the Medico-Chirurgical College of Philadelphia.

Mihran Kassabian invented a positioning device that displayed the ribs as round rather than flat on X-ray images.

Mihran Kassabian had a special interest in the use of X-ray findings in court proceedings.

Mihran Kassabian's first published paper discussed the side effects of radiation, and he experienced these problems firsthand.

Mihran Kassabian was born in Kayseri in the Cappadocia region of Asia Minor.

Mihran Kassabian had three brothers, all of whom became jewelers in Smyrna.

Mihran Kassabian grew up in poverty and, as biographer Percy Brown put it, "with almost constant danger of earthquake or massacre" during his early years.

Mihran Kassabian was discharged from the Army Hospital Corps at the conclusion of the war.

The conflict had been brief; before the end of 1898, Mihran Kassabian had returned to Philadelphia and received his medical degree.

Early in his career, Mihran Kassabian worked as an instructor at the Medico-Chirurgical College.

The first clinical X-ray had been taken in 1896, and Mihran Kassabian became interested in skiagraphy soon after the appearance of X-ray machines in US hospitals.

At the time that Mihran Kassabian was becoming interested in skiagraphy, medical school administrators viewed physician skiagraphers more like photographers than medical professionals.

Mihran Kassabian set up his X-ray facilities in the college's old operating theater.

In 1902, Mihran Kassabian resigned from the college and took over as director of the Roentgen Ray Laboratory at Philadelphia General Hospital.

Mihran Kassabian invented a positioning device for chest X-rays that displayed the roundness of the ribs; previously, X-ray images had rendered them as flat.

The heart could not be seen on X-rays at that time, so Mihran Kassabian injected patients with a contrast agent, bismuth subnitrate.

Mihran Kassabian hoped that as bismuth flowed through the heart, it would make the heart visible on X-ray.

Mihran Kassabian served as chair of the medicolegal committee of the American Roentgen Ray Society, and he believed that X-rays could reduce frivolous litigation by providing judges and juries with visual depictions of the medical information pertinent to court cases.

Work with fluoroscopy required Mihran Kassabian to be exposed to radiation for the duration of each patient's X-ray exam.

Mihran Kassabian's first published paper, X-ray as an irritant, drew on two years of experience with radiography exams at the college as well as his experience in the Spanish-American War.

Mihran Kassabian had first noted reddened areas of skin on his hands earlier that year.

In 1902, Mihran Kassabian sustained serious radiation burns to his hands.

Mihran Kassabian kept a journal and took photographs of his hands as his tissue injuries progressed.

Mihran Kassabian knew that his radiation-related problems did not represent an isolated case.

Mihran Kassabian was diagnosed with skin cancer, which was thought to be related to radiation exposure, in 1909.

Mihran Kassabian continued to work with vigor during his illness; he did not want his patients to know that he had been made ill by radiation exposure.

Mihran Kassabian was acutely aware that some people experienced anxiety before undergoing X-ray studies.

Mihran Kassabian had given conference presentations in which he discussed administering sedation to such patients.

Mihran Kassabian even argued against the use of the word burns to describe radiation injuries, believing that such wording might alarm the public and stall the progress that was being made in the field.

Mihran Kassabian had come to Jefferson Hospital about ten days earlier to have a dressing changed on his chest.

About 18 months before his death, Mihran Kassabian had married Virginia Giragosian from Constantinople.

Shortly before Kassabian died, the J B Lippincott Company announced that it would publish a second edition of his textbook.