Joseph Lister (1827-1912)

Lister was a British surgeon who radically changed surgical practice with the introduction of antiseptics. They reduced the risk of bacterial infection during surgery. Lister’s antiseptic solution of carbolic acid was used to clean wounds and surgical cuts and to scrub surgeons’ hands. Lister believed that infection was caused by airborne dust particles, so he also sprayed the air with carbolic acid. The equipment was heated to a high temperature to make it bacteria free. His discoveries met with initial resistance but had become widely accepted by the 1880s when he introduced antiseptic catgut ligatures. Ligatures are the strong threads used to sew surgical wounds together. He also devised new operations and invented several surgical instruments.