January 18, 2007

 

Anesthesia Ranked in Top Five of Greatest Medical Milestones Poll

Anesthesia was voted one of the top five greatest medical breakthroughs since 1840, according to results released today in a poll by the British Medical Journal.

More than 11,000 doctors and members of the public voted for their top medical breakthrough in the British Medical Journal “Medical Milestones” Poll with Sanitation receiving the most votes (1795), followed by Antibiotics (1642), Anesthesia (1574), Vaccines (1337) and the Discovery of DNA Structure (1000).

Voters chose from a list of 15 advances that were compiled by BMJ from more than 100 breakthrough nominations by readers, based on the ability of the medical development to change lives around the world. Voting took place online at www.bmj.com  from January 5 to January 14, 2007.  

Fore more information on the results, visit www.bmj.com.