Citation

Gordetsky JB, Rais-Bahrami S, Rabinowitz R. J. Pediatr. Urol. 2024; 20(1): e10.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2024, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/j.jpurol.2023.11.031

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

In the late 19th century, a beautiful woman was said to have drowned in the River Seine and had a plaster death mask created to capture her beauty. Called L'Inconnue de la Seine (The Unknown Woman of the Seine) and "La Joconde du suicide" (The Mona Lisa of Suicide), the image went on to inspire art, literature, and popular culture. Our current understanding of forensic pathology makes it highly unlikely that the cast of the Inconnue was actually taken from a deceased person. The death mask of the Inconnue lives on in modern medicine in the face of the Resusci Anne mannequin, which is used for Cardio-Pulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) training.

The techniques of CPR were largely established by Peter J. Safar and James Elam. Peter Safar was chief of the Department of Anesthesiology at Baltimore City Hospital. At the American Society of Anesthesiologists meeting in 1956, he met James Elam, who had discovered that expired air could maintain appropriate blood oxygenation. In 1958 Dr. Safar presented at the Scandinavian Society of Anesthetists, where he was introduced to Norwegian toy maker Asmund Laerdal. Dr. Safar recognized the need for training mannequins to propel forward the knowledge of mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. Asmund Laerdal subsequently created a life-like mannequin (Resusci Anne) that had the appropriate head mobility, airway obstruction, and chest inflation with ventilation. For the face of the mannequin, Laerdal chose a classic beauty, a woman taken in the prime of her life from drowning; the death mask of the Inconnue. Thus, a death mask from the late 19th century became the face of modern simulation training in medicine, showing how stories and faces of history continue to inspire throughout the ages and drive progress in medicine.

Language: en