Jan Janský

January Janský ( born April 3, 1873 in Prague, † September 8, 1921 in Horni Černošice ) was a Czech physician, psychiatrist and neurologist. He discovered the four blood groups.

Life

The son of a businessman visited a high school and began after graduating from the study of medicine at the University of Prague, which he completed in 1898. From 1899 he worked as a physician at the psychiatric clinic in Prague.

He dealt with the search for a connection between the blood clot ( hemagglutination ) and mental illnesses. Result of his many years of research was that there is no connection. He published his results in his book Hematologická study u psychotiků. As a byproduct of his investigations Janský categorized the blood into four groups, which he described with Roman numerals I to IV.

Janský pursued the investigation no further, his main interest remained psychiatry. In addition, he also performed neurological examinations and devoted himself intensively to the study of the cerebrospinal fluid.

In 1914 he was appointed professor at the Czech University and representative of the director of the psychiatric clinic. In the same year he had to go to the front and returned in 1916 after a heart attack, exempt from military service, in the homeland. After the end of the First World War, he took over the management of the neuropsychiatric department of the soldier Hospital in Prague. He died three years later from the effects of angina pectoris.

In 1921 he was recognized as the discoverer of the four blood groups of the American Medical Commission. Although Karl Landsteiner led before him by a grouping, however, the blood groups told only in three categories.

Janský wrote a large number of scientific papers, mostly concerned with psychiatric problems. In addition, he promoted blood donation. Even today, voluntary blood donors is given in recognition of the medal Prof. Mudr January Janský.

In the former Czechoslovakia was created in 1953, directed by Martin Fric, a biopic about Jan Janský under the title " The Secret of the Blood ".