Jean-Baptiste Sarlandière

Jean-Baptiste Sarlandière (9 May 1787 to 25 July 1838) was a French anatomist and physiologist, born in Aix-la-Chapelle. He began medical studies at the hospital in Noirmoutiers at sixteen, served in the French Army from 1803 to 1814, resumed his studies, became a physician at the military hospital in Paris and took his medical degree in 1815. In Paris he was a friend and assistant to François Magendie and collaborated with him on physiological experiments. He is remembered for introducing electroacupuncture to European medicine, using the needle as a conductor to apply electricity under the skin, a technique reportedly used for respiratory and rheumatic disorders and some forms of paralysis and soon adopted in French hospitals. In 1817 he invented the bdellomètre, a mechanical blood pump meant to replace leeches in bloodletting. His writings include a treatise on electroacupuncture (1825) and Anatomie méthodique (1830). Nothing here is medical advice.