Semmelweis Reflex has been reviewed and written about in a medical peer reviewed paper set out in Science Direct where it states
"We aim to familiarize the readers with the term that not only has a significant historical background but also grave clinical implications." See full QUOTE later below
Whatever anyones views are we are all at risk from the Semmelweis Reflex EVEN if we are 100% correct and history proves us so.
It should be noted that this condition effects most people and that Dr Semmelweis died at 47 years old of injuries he received, probably related if only indirectly to his beliefs and, around 15 days after he was taken to a hospital against his will and without any need to be there.
When we view the Semmelweis Reflex in todays context and then add to this the use of the media by all sides wishing to distort or control new or different views or technology, even from challanging views that may be valid, it becomes even more important to remain aware of the Semmelweis Reflex for your own health
There is an inbuilt bias in all professions and cultures for the vast majority to find ways to reject changes (despite adequate evidence) that go against the established beliefs. This has caused many serious problems throughout human history
QUOTE
"Semmelweis reflex is a human behavioral tendency to stick to preexisting beliefs and to reject fresh ideas that contradict them (despite adequate evidence).
We aim to familiarize the readers with the term that not only has a significant historical background but also grave clinical implications.
Methods
A keyword search for “Semmelweis reflex,” “Belief perseverance,” “handwashing,” and “Idea rejection” was conducted using PubMed Central, MEDLINE, and Google SCHOLAR. Literature published in paper-based journals and books was also searched. All manuscripts pertaining to these keywords were thoroughly analyzed for this review.
Results
The first section of our paper briefs the story of Ignaz Semmelweis and brushes on the contributions of other intellectual researchers that were rebuffed initially. The discussion further explains the root cause of this dismissal, an inherent bias against uncertainty that may be at the core of our fear for new ideas. Finally, this review explores the means by which we can prevent ourselves from being a victim of rejection.
Conclusions
The age-old prejudice that is Semmelweis reflex is explored in this review. With careful and thorough study design, scientific rigor, and critical self-analysis of the manuscript, one can avoid being victimized by this reflex. The dual edged nature of this reflex lays unveiled when its importance is highlighted in the prematurely accepted medical failures. Understanding that any new idea goes through the grill of being critically analyzed and perceived encourages the scientist to hold on to the original thought as it may rather be practice changing.
www.sciencedirect.com
Names like: Van Gogh, Galileo, Dickinson, Tesla, and Edgar Allen Poe come to mind. But what all these names also have in common is that they belong to those who found no fame in life, but only in death. We may remember them as triumphant revolutionaries, but their lives were filled with more defeats than victories and their “great works” were their unhealthy obsessions.
With the passing of time, their passions were validated, but to those apart of their lives; these works were the mad ramblings and scribblings of a lost son or daughter.
Their defeats came to them at the hands of a common human reaction coined the “Semmelweis Reflex,” which describes the human instinct to adamantly deny evidence of new ideas that contradict the popular established norms or paradigms.
The earth is flat. Animals don’t evolve. Your art sucks.
Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis, who gives the reflex its name, was a Hungarian physician in the mid 1800s and may just be the reason you are alive today.
If you ever wondered who first had the idea for hand sanitizer, alcohol wipes, or disinfectant, well that was Semmelweis. Basically this guy invented hand washing.

As the father of antiseptic science, he was the first to hypothesize that disease could be spread through touch via “infectious material” on the skin. This might seem like a simple idea to us now, but only 200 years ago people believed disease came from bad smells or an imbalance of bodily fluids. Mankind had no idea that germs even existed or how sickness was transmitted.
Dr. Semmelweis came to this revolutionary discovery by making a astute observation at the hospital in which he worked. This hospital, like many others in those days, had both a large maternity ward and a morgue. Thus, due to understaffing and ignorance, doctors would routinely handle both patients and cadavers in the same day without washing their hands.
Some of these doctors at Semmelweis’s hospital cut themselves while handling the dead bodies and contracted a feverish disease; a very similar disease was also found in many mothers in the maternity ward after giving birth. Semmelweis had a hunch that these two diseases were in fact the same.
The disease is now called Puerperal Fever but back then it was referred to as childbed fever.
Through trial and error, Dr. Semmelweis was able to come up with a chlorinated lime solution that cleaned the skin of any “particles” causing disease. He did this without any knowledge that germs existed or any understanding of why his methods worked.
It would not be until after Semmelweis’s death that Louis Pasteur’s “Germ Theory” would prove that micro-organisms like bacteria are the culprits of this transmission.

Nevertheless, Dr. Semmelweis did notice that if he added a hand washing step in between the morgue and maternity ward, he could essentially eliminate a disease that was previously killing almost 20% of his post pregnancy patients.
This was a incredible feat! Seriously, the man simply told doctors to wash their hands and he saved hundreds of lives a year.
What was next? The good Doctor wanted to share this discovery with the world. So he raced all over Europe to different hospitals to give talks and published papers on his discovery. In his mind the evidence was too powerful to ignore and he was destined to be the golden boy of 1800’s medicine.
But instead he found nothing but rejection and resentment from doctors across the world who were insulted that Semmelweis was implying that they were the reason for their patients sickness.
Semmelweis was essentially telling physicians that they had been responsible for hundreds of patients deaths…
One very skeptical physician even rebuked,
“It seems improbable that enough infective matter or vapor could be secluded around the fingernails to kill a patient.” –Carl Edvard Marius Levy
And so, instead of glorious ascension, Ignaz Semmelweis fell into depression, mental instability and was eventually admitted against his will into a mental institution. There he ironically died of an infection or “blood poisoning” contracted after the guards gave him a especially bad beating leading to open wounds.

Semmelweis died thinking himself a failure.
He had no clue that his ideas would go on to inspire Pasteur’s “Germ Theory” of disease and give us the knowledge needed to combat disease in a way unseen in human history. He would then be remembered as the “father of Antiseptic Science” and have hospitals and universities named after him. He would receive more praise in death than any humble Hungarian Physician would expect in a lifetime.
But does that change the story for Semmelweis? Does that make his decent into insanity and tragedy any less painful for him? No, Semmelweis is long gone and any adulation thrown his way in unheard from the grave.
Don’t get me wrong, it is great to honor our histories heroes so that people can remember the sacrifices made for progress. However; what have we missed out on from the time lost ignoring these revolutionaries or driving them to early graves?
Instead of being reactive to the Semmelweis’s of the world and giving them praise once they are gone; perhaps the answer is to fight against this “Semmelweis Reflex” everyday so that we wont miss out on the next great revolutionaries.
matterundermind.com
"We aim to familiarize the readers with the term that not only has a significant historical background but also grave clinical implications." See full QUOTE later below
Whatever anyones views are we are all at risk from the Semmelweis Reflex EVEN if we are 100% correct and history proves us so.
It should be noted that this condition effects most people and that Dr Semmelweis died at 47 years old of injuries he received, probably related if only indirectly to his beliefs and, around 15 days after he was taken to a hospital against his will and without any need to be there.
When we view the Semmelweis Reflex in todays context and then add to this the use of the media by all sides wishing to distort or control new or different views or technology, even from challanging views that may be valid, it becomes even more important to remain aware of the Semmelweis Reflex for your own health
There is an inbuilt bias in all professions and cultures for the vast majority to find ways to reject changes (despite adequate evidence) that go against the established beliefs. This has caused many serious problems throughout human history
QUOTE
"Semmelweis reflex is a human behavioral tendency to stick to preexisting beliefs and to reject fresh ideas that contradict them (despite adequate evidence).
We aim to familiarize the readers with the term that not only has a significant historical background but also grave clinical implications.
Methods
A keyword search for “Semmelweis reflex,” “Belief perseverance,” “handwashing,” and “Idea rejection” was conducted using PubMed Central, MEDLINE, and Google SCHOLAR. Literature published in paper-based journals and books was also searched. All manuscripts pertaining to these keywords were thoroughly analyzed for this review.
Results
The first section of our paper briefs the story of Ignaz Semmelweis and brushes on the contributions of other intellectual researchers that were rebuffed initially. The discussion further explains the root cause of this dismissal, an inherent bias against uncertainty that may be at the core of our fear for new ideas. Finally, this review explores the means by which we can prevent ourselves from being a victim of rejection.
Conclusions
The age-old prejudice that is Semmelweis reflex is explored in this review. With careful and thorough study design, scientific rigor, and critical self-analysis of the manuscript, one can avoid being victimized by this reflex. The dual edged nature of this reflex lays unveiled when its importance is highlighted in the prematurely accepted medical failures. Understanding that any new idea goes through the grill of being critically analyzed and perceived encourages the scientist to hold on to the original thought as it may rather be practice changing.

Semmelweis Reflex: An Age-Old Prejudice
Semmelweis reflex is a human behavioral tendency to stick to preexisting beliefs and to reject fresh ideas that contradict them (despite adequate evid…
Names like: Van Gogh, Galileo, Dickinson, Tesla, and Edgar Allen Poe come to mind. But what all these names also have in common is that they belong to those who found no fame in life, but only in death. We may remember them as triumphant revolutionaries, but their lives were filled with more defeats than victories and their “great works” were their unhealthy obsessions.
With the passing of time, their passions were validated, but to those apart of their lives; these works were the mad ramblings and scribblings of a lost son or daughter.
Their defeats came to them at the hands of a common human reaction coined the “Semmelweis Reflex,” which describes the human instinct to adamantly deny evidence of new ideas that contradict the popular established norms or paradigms.
The earth is flat. Animals don’t evolve. Your art sucks.
Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis, who gives the reflex its name, was a Hungarian physician in the mid 1800s and may just be the reason you are alive today.
If you ever wondered who first had the idea for hand sanitizer, alcohol wipes, or disinfectant, well that was Semmelweis. Basically this guy invented hand washing.

As the father of antiseptic science, he was the first to hypothesize that disease could be spread through touch via “infectious material” on the skin. This might seem like a simple idea to us now, but only 200 years ago people believed disease came from bad smells or an imbalance of bodily fluids. Mankind had no idea that germs even existed or how sickness was transmitted.
Dr. Semmelweis came to this revolutionary discovery by making a astute observation at the hospital in which he worked. This hospital, like many others in those days, had both a large maternity ward and a morgue. Thus, due to understaffing and ignorance, doctors would routinely handle both patients and cadavers in the same day without washing their hands.
Some of these doctors at Semmelweis’s hospital cut themselves while handling the dead bodies and contracted a feverish disease; a very similar disease was also found in many mothers in the maternity ward after giving birth. Semmelweis had a hunch that these two diseases were in fact the same.
The disease is now called Puerperal Fever but back then it was referred to as childbed fever.
Through trial and error, Dr. Semmelweis was able to come up with a chlorinated lime solution that cleaned the skin of any “particles” causing disease. He did this without any knowledge that germs existed or any understanding of why his methods worked.
It would not be until after Semmelweis’s death that Louis Pasteur’s “Germ Theory” would prove that micro-organisms like bacteria are the culprits of this transmission.

Nevertheless, Dr. Semmelweis did notice that if he added a hand washing step in between the morgue and maternity ward, he could essentially eliminate a disease that was previously killing almost 20% of his post pregnancy patients.
This was a incredible feat! Seriously, the man simply told doctors to wash their hands and he saved hundreds of lives a year.
What was next? The good Doctor wanted to share this discovery with the world. So he raced all over Europe to different hospitals to give talks and published papers on his discovery. In his mind the evidence was too powerful to ignore and he was destined to be the golden boy of 1800’s medicine.
But instead he found nothing but rejection and resentment from doctors across the world who were insulted that Semmelweis was implying that they were the reason for their patients sickness.
Semmelweis was essentially telling physicians that they had been responsible for hundreds of patients deaths…
One very skeptical physician even rebuked,
“It seems improbable that enough infective matter or vapor could be secluded around the fingernails to kill a patient.” –Carl Edvard Marius Levy
And so, instead of glorious ascension, Ignaz Semmelweis fell into depression, mental instability and was eventually admitted against his will into a mental institution. There he ironically died of an infection or “blood poisoning” contracted after the guards gave him a especially bad beating leading to open wounds.

Semmelweis died thinking himself a failure.
He had no clue that his ideas would go on to inspire Pasteur’s “Germ Theory” of disease and give us the knowledge needed to combat disease in a way unseen in human history. He would then be remembered as the “father of Antiseptic Science” and have hospitals and universities named after him. He would receive more praise in death than any humble Hungarian Physician would expect in a lifetime.
But does that change the story for Semmelweis? Does that make his decent into insanity and tragedy any less painful for him? No, Semmelweis is long gone and any adulation thrown his way in unheard from the grave.
Don’t get me wrong, it is great to honor our histories heroes so that people can remember the sacrifices made for progress. However; what have we missed out on from the time lost ignoring these revolutionaries or driving them to early graves?
Instead of being reactive to the Semmelweis’s of the world and giving them praise once they are gone; perhaps the answer is to fight against this “Semmelweis Reflex” everyday so that we wont miss out on the next great revolutionaries.

The Semmelweis Reflex (famous only in death)
Revolutionaries play on a different timeline. They see further and their ideas live longer. Pushing past ridicule and ritual they open up new worlds so that when they die, instead of being forgotten, they are immortalized. Names like: Van Gogh, Galileo, Dickinson, Tesla, and Edgar Allen Poe...

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