Hans Chiari

Who was Hans Chiari?

Hans Chiari was an Austrian pathologist who was a native of Vienna. He was the son of gynecologist Johann Baptist Chiari, and brother to rhinolaryngologist Ottokar Chiari.

Chiari studied medicine in Vienna, where he was an assistant to Karl Freiherr von Rokitansky and Richard Ladislaus Heschl. In 1878 he received his habilitation in pathological anatomy, and within a few years became an associate professor at the University of Prague. At Prague he was also superintendent of the pathological-anatomical museum. In 1906 he relocated to the University of Strasbourg as a professor of pathological anatomy.

Chiari's research dealt largely with postmortem examinations, and most of his numerous writings are the result of autopsies. In 1891 he described a condition in which the inferior poles of the cerebellar hemispheres and the medulla oblongata extend through the foramen magnum into the spinal canal. The phenomenon was to become known as the "Arnold-Chiari malformation", named after Chiari and German pathologist, Julius Arnold. The malformation was given its name in 1907 by two of Dr. Arnold's students.