Franz Karl Ludwig Wilhelm von Winckel (June 5, 1837 - December 31, 1911) was a German gynecologist and obstetrician who was a native of Berleburg. In 1860 he received his medical doctorate from Berlin

Berlin

Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

, and in 1864 became a professor of gynecology in Rostock

Rostock

Rostock -Early history:In the 11th century Polabian Slavs founded a settlement at the Warnow river called Roztoc ; the name Rostock is derived from that designation. The Danish king Valdemar I set the town aflame in 1161.Afterwards the place was settled by German traders...

. In 1872 he became director of the Königlichen Landesentbindungsschule in Dresden

Dresden

Dresden is the capital city of the Free State of Saxony in Germany. It is situated in a valley on the River Elbe, near the Czech border. The Dresden conurbation is part of the Saxon Triangle metropolitan area....

, and from 1883 until 1907 was director of the Frauenklinik at the University of Munich.

Franz von Winckel was the first president of the Deutschen Gesellschaft für Gynäkologie und Geburtshilfe (German Society for Gynecology and Obstetrics). His name is lent to "Winckel's disease", which is a fatal disease of newborns that is sometimes referred to as epidemic hemoglobinuria

Hemoglobinuria

In medicine, hemoglobinuria or haemoglobinuria is a condition in which the oxygen transport protein hemoglobin is found in abnormally high concentrations in the urine. The condition is often associated with hemolytic anemia, in which red blood cells are destroyed, thereby increasing levels of free...

, and also to a birthing procedure known as the Wigand-Martin-Winckel-Handgriff. This maneuver is named in conjunction with Justus Heinrich Wigand

Justus Heinrich Wigand

Justus Heinrich Wigand was a German obstetrician who was a native of Reval.Wigand studied medicine at the Universities of Jena and Erlangen, earning his doctorate at the latter...

(1769-1817) and August Eduard Martin (1847-1933).

Selected writings

• Die Krankheiten der weiblichen Harnröhre und Blase (Diseases of the Female Urethra and Bladder); 1877
• Die Pathologie der weiblichen Sexual-Organe (Pathology of the Female Sex Organs) Hirzel, Leipzig 1881.
• Handbuch der Geburtshülfe (Handbook of Obstetrics) 3 Bd., Bergmann, Wiesbaden 1903–1907.