THE LASAGNE OATH

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The Lasagna oath

Louis Lasagna

Dr. Louis Lasagna - Digital Collections - National Library of Medicine


    Early life and education

    Lasagna was an internationally recognized and respected expert in clinical pharmacology. Born in Queens, New York in 1923, Lasagna was raised in New Brunswick, New Jersey, by his Italian immigrant parents. He graduated from Rutgers University in 1943 and earned his medical degree from Columbia University in 1947. 

    During his time at Rutgers University, he joined Kappa Sigma Fraternity (Gamma-Upsilon). After completing a clinical research fellowship in anesthesia at Harvard Medical School, Lasagna joined the faculty of Johns Hopkins University in 1954, where he established the first ever clinical pharmacology department. 

    Lasagna taught medicine and pharmacology at Johns Hopkins until 1970, when he accepted the position as the first chairman of the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology at the University of Rochester's, School of Medicine and Dentistry, which he held for the next decade (1970–1980). 

    Early in his fourteen-year career at Rochester, Lasagna founded the Center for the Study of Drug Development, later called the Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development. In July 1984, the Center moved with Lasagna to Tufts University, where he became dean of the Sackler School of Graduate Biomedical Sciences.

    While living in Rochester, Lasagna was also active in the city's cultural life, serving as the President of the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, supporting the Garth Fagan Dance company, and writing, directing, and starring in the "Mighty Lasagna Players" annual theater production by the University of Rochester, Department of Pharmacology Medical and Toxicology students and faculty.

    Revision of Hippocratic oath

    Throughout Lasagna's career he wrote and lectured extensively on a variety of topics. He was well known for his simple eloquence, as well as his sense of humor and humanity in addressing such controversial topics as birth control, abortion, euthanasia, and medical experimentation on humans. In 1964, Lasagna wrote a modernized version of the Hippocratic Oath,[2] which emphasized a holistic and compassionate approach to medicine. Today, the "Lasagna Oath"[3] has been adopted by many medical colleges.

  1. I swear to fulfill, to the best of my ability and judgment, this covenant:
  2. I will respect the hard-won scientific gains of those physicians in whose steps I walk, and gladly share such knowledge as is mine with those who are to follow.
  3. I will apply, for the benefit of the sick, all measures [that] are required, avoiding those twin traps of overtreatment and therapeutic nihilism.
  4. I will remember that there is art to medicine as well as science, and that warmth, sympathy, and understanding may outweigh the surgeon's knife or the chemist's drug.
  5. I will not be ashamed to say "I know not," nor will I fail to call in my colleagues when the skills of another are needed for a patient's recovery.
  6. I will respect the privacy of my patients, for their problems are not disclosed to me that the world may know. Most especially must I tread with care in matters of life and death. If it is given me to save a life, all thanks. But it may also be within my power to take a life; this awesome responsibility must be faced with great humbleness and awareness of my own frailty. Above all, I must not play at God.
  7. I will remember that I do not treat a fever chart, a cancerous growth, but a sick human being, whose illness may affect the person's family and economic stability. My responsibility includes these related problems, if I am to care adequately for the sick.
  8. I will prevent disease whenever I can, for prevention is preferable to cure.
  9. I will protect the environment which sustains us, in the knowledge that the continuing health of ourselves and our societies is dependent on a healthy planet.
  10. I will remember that I remain a member of society, with special obligations to all my fellow human beings, those sound of mind and body as well as the infirm.
  11. If I do not violate this oath, may I enjoy life and art, respected while I live and remembered with affection thereafter. May I always act so as to preserve the finest traditions of my calling and may I long experience the joy of healing those who seek my help.

And as always have a chilled day from the Viking

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