Bernard Peyrilhe

Bernard Peyrilhe (1735–1804)^[1] was a French surgeon, known as one of the founders of experimental cancer research.^[2] Peyrilhe was born in Pompignan,^[3] and became a lecturer at the Paris School of Surgery (École de Chirurgie).^[1]

In 1773, Peyrilhe was studying for a PhD,^[4] when he wrote the first systematic review of cancer^[5] in a prize-winning essay which he submitted to the Academy of Letters and Fine Arts in Lyon in response to an essay competition entitled What is Cancer?.^[1] His essay covered the nature of the disease, its growth, treatment, and how a "virus" produced by the tumor caused wasting (cachexia).^[5] At the time, the term "virus" meant any substance which came from an animal's body and which could transmit a disease.^[6] Peyrilhe attempted to demonstrate this virus, by injecting an emulsion of fluid from a human breast cancer into a wound he had created on the back of a dog.^[1][5] He kept the dog at his home to observe it, but the dog developed an abscess at the injection site and howled so much that Peyrilhe's servants drowned it.^[7] As is now understood, the transfer of cancerous tissue between species is generally unsuccessful, as the recipient's immune system recognizes cells from a different species as foreign, and destroys them (a graft-versus-host interaction).^[8]

Also in 1773, Peyrihle was the first surgeon to treat breast cancer by radical mastectomy which included both the pectoral muscle and axillary lymph nodes.^[9] He considered that the risks of amputating the pectoral muscle were outweighed by the otherwise certain outcome of death.^[10]

Peyrilhe also successfully treated ulceration with carbolic acid, which was, at the time, a recently discovered acid.^[5]

• Peyrilhe, Bernard (1774). Dissertatio Academica de Cancro [A dissertation on cancerous diseases] (in Latin). J.J.G. De Marcour.
• Peyrilhe, Bernard (1786). Remède nouveau contre les maladies vénériennes [New cure for venereal diseases] (in French). Chez Didot le jeune, Barrois le jeune.