Noël Guéneau de Mussy

Who was Noël Guéneau de Mussy?

Noël-Francois-Odon Guéneau de Mussy was a French physician who was a native of Paris. He was the son of writer Philibert Guéneau de Mussy, and grandson to hygienist Jean Noël Hallé.

In 1835 he became an interne to Paris hospitals, and in 1837 received his medical doctorate. In 1842 he became médecin des hôpitaux, working at the Hôpital Saint-Antoine, Hôpital de la Pitié and Hôtel-Dieu de Paris. Two of his better known assistants were ophthalmologist Henri Parinaud and pediatric surgeon Edouard Francis Kirmisson.

A member of the French Académie Nationale de Médecine, Guéneau de Mussy made contributions in his research of pertussis, hemiglossitis, exophthalmic goitre and glandular angina. Among his written works was the four-volume Clinique médicale.

His name is lent to the eponymous "Guéneau de Mussy point", an anatomical location germane in cases of diaphragmatic pleurisy. It is located on the left border of the sternum at the end of the bony portion of the tenth rib. If diaphragmatic pleurisy is present, the point becomes exceedingly painful when pressure is applied to it.