Ludwig Van Beethoven's Death
Caitlin Cavallaro
BIOGRAPHY
Died: March 26, 1827 in Vienna, Austria
He died at 56 years old.
He was a music composer.
History of Beethoven
His Disease
Treatments: then and now
Then
- Doctors would drill a hole in his stomach to such out unwanted waste.
- There was no such thing as pain medicine.
- There was no such thing as stitches.
- The doctors plugged the hole with a rag.
- Doctors reused the same hole with unsanitary condition causing infections.
- They tried to give him a sweat bath to sweat out the liquid. (Made him absorb all the water from the bath.)
- They did an autopsy on him after he died and all they did was make a mess of things.
Now
- Doctors today would have figured out that Beethoven had lead poisoning.
- Then they would remove all sources of contamination.
- You could receive chelation therapy. This is where you take medicine that binds with the lead so it gets excreted with your urine.
- Or you could receive EDTA therapy. This is where you take a drug that is mostly a chemical called ethylenediaminetetradcetic acid(EDTA).
- In severe cases, it might not be possible to reverse the damage that has occurred. Instead, the doctors try to prevent it from getting worse.
Timeline
Beethoven contracted pneumonia and he couldn't go to the bathrom. He got pneumonia and he couldn't get rid of it. This started a hole mess of problems to arise.
He got dropsy and the doctors had to drain his waste. This made Beethoven sicker and he got infected.
Beethoven died at 56. This was the end of his life. He could no longer make any more music. The doctors never really knew what officially caused his death. They gave him an autopsy and they found that his organs were either too big or too small.
Doctors dug up Beethoven to look at his head. They were able to take pictures of it now. To keep it safe, some guy took it home. They soon found out that the guy ended up giving parts of Beethoven's skull away.
Some skull collectors were able to recover pieces of his skull. Some doctors were able to analyze the pieces again. They discovered that Beethoven had massive lead poisoning. The researchers believe that this is what Beethoven died of and that the lead poisoning caused most of his problems in his life.
Vocabulary
- Analyze-to separate into constituent parts or elements; determine the elements or essential features
- Autopsy-inspection and dissection of a body after death, as for determination of the cause of death
- Dropsy-When fluid inside your body that's supposed to get out can't
- Lead Poisoning-a toxic condition produced by ingestion, inhalation, or skin absorption of lead or lead compounds
- Steam Bath-sweat out liquid; You're put in a tub filled with jugs of hot water