[From the bath- and massage to the sports clinic--the Rheumatological Department of Bispebjerg Hospital 1913-2006].

Abstract

At the turn of the previous century, the number of inhabitants in the City of Copenhagen increased greatly. A new large hospital, Bispebjerg Hospital, stood ready in 1913. At the time, access to light, fresh air, and open spaces was considered to be important factors in the battle against disease. Physical treatment such as different forms of bathing, massage, exercise, electricity and radioactivity were also much relied upon, and a large building for this treatment in the form of a Roman thermal bath was built at the clinic of physical medicine. The first head of the clinic, Hans Jansen (1875-1933), was a specialist in internal medicine who studied physical treatments for a wide range of diseases, including phototherapy, as a collaborator of the Nobel Prize laureate Niels Finsen. Later, Jansen focused on the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis. It was left to the internal medicine ward at Bispebjerg Hospital to introduce the first effective treatment with the gold compound Sanocrysin during the 1930's. In 1918, physical therapy, physiatry (in Danish, fysiurgi), was established as a medical speciality in Denmark. The next head of the clinic, from 1933 Knud Aage Rasmussen (1897-1976), a specialist in fysiurgi, focused on the treatment of regional and general rheumatic pain syndromes. The rehabilitation of patients with different diseases by gymnastic exercises had been in use from the start of the clinic, but in the late 1940's more emphasis was put on this treatment under the influence of impulses from the USA, and as a response to demographic change with an increased number of older individuals with physical challenges in the City of Copenhagen. A rehabilitation ward was established and together with the clinic of physiotherapy formed a new department in 1968 under the leadership of Lone Gjørup (1923-2005). At the same time, interest in the treatment of inflammatory rheumatic diseases rose after the discovery of glucocorticoids as potent anti-inflammatory compounds. The department at Bispebjerg Hospital followed this dual course of treatment of inflammatory diseases with new drugs and rehabilitation. Recent new technology and interest in sports medicine promoted research in physical training in the clinic and eventually gave rise to a separate research and development unit devoted to sports medicine.