Samuel Alexander Kinnier Wilson | |
---|---|
Born |
Cedarville, New Jersey, U.S. |
December 6, 1878
Died | May 12, 1937 London, England |
(aged 58)
Known for | First to describe Wilson's disease |
Children | James Kinnier Wilson |
Samuel Alexander Kinnier Wilson (December 6, 1878 – May 12, 1937) was an American born-British neurologist who was the first to describe Wilson's disease. He was the father of British Assyriologist James Kinnier Wilson.
He was born in Cedarville, New Jersey. A year after Wilson's birth, his father died and his family moved to Edinburgh. In 1902 he graduated with an M.B. from the University of Edinburgh Medical School, and during the following year he received his B.Sc. in physiology. Afterwards he traveled to Paris, where he studied with neurologists Pierre Marie (1853–1940) and Joseph Babinski (1857–1932). In 1905 he relocated to London, where he worked as registrar and pathologist at the National Hospital, Queens Square. Later, he was appointed professor of neurology at King's College Hospital.
Wilson specialized in clinical neurology, and made important contributions in his studies of epilepsy, narcolepsy, apraxia and speech disorders. He described hepatolenticular degeneration in his Gold Medal winning M.D. dissertation of 1912 titled "Progressive lenticular degeneration" from the University of Edinburgh Medical School. He was honored for his research of the disease, and afterwards the disorder became known as "Wilson's disease". From his treatise, he is credited for introducing the term "extrapyramidal" into neurological medicine.