Francis Xavier Dercum

Francis Xavier Dercum (August 10, 1856 – April 24, 1931) was an American physician who first described the disease Adiposis dolorosa (also known as Dercum's disease). He was a noted neurologist and specialised in treating nervous and mental disorders. He treated President Woodrow Wilson in 1919, and Ima Hogg for three years, beginning in 1918.

Dercum was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He was educated at the local high school and attended medical school of the University of Pennsylvania. He received his medical degree in 1877. He began his medical practice and served as a consultant pathologist at the State Mental Hospital in Norristown, Pennsylvania. In 1879, at the University of Pennsylvania, he was a demonstrator in histology. In 1881, he was demonstrator in the physiology laboratory, and in 1882, he was an instructor in nervous diseases, also at the University of Pennsylvania. From 1883 to 1892, Dercum served as chief of the Nervous Disease Clinic (University of Pennsylvania). He joined the staff of the Philadelphia General Hospital in 1887. In 1911, he became a consulting neurologist at the hospital.

Dercum pursued research endeavors. He studied the semicircular canals and, in 1879, he published an article on their morphology. In 1892, he was the first to publish a description of Adiposis dolorosa. He published over 200 articles including several textbooks, in the medical areas of anatomy, physiology, pathology, psychology, and therapeutics.

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