Maximilian Stoll was an Austrian physician who was a native of Erzingen

Balingen

Balingen is a town in Baden-Württemberg, Germany, capital of the district of Zollernalbkreis. It is located nearby the Swabian Alb, approx. 35 km to the south of Tübingen, 35 km northeast of Villingen-Schwenningen, and 60 km southwest of Stuttgart.It is home to the Bizerba and Ideal...

, Baden-Württemberg

Baden-Württemberg

Baden-Württemberg is one of the 16 states of Germany. Baden-Württemberg is in the southwestern part of the country to the east of the Upper Rhine, and is the third largest in both area and population of Germany's sixteen states, with an area of and 10.7 million inhabitants...

. Stoll originally trained as a theologian, but switched to medicine, and in 1776 attained a chair at the University of Vienna

University of Vienna

The University of Vienna is a public university located in Vienna, Austria. It was founded by Duke Rudolph IV in 1365 and is the oldest university in the German-speaking world...

. Soon afterwards, he succeeded Anton de Haen

Anton de Haen

Anton de Haen was an Austrian physician of Dutch ancestry born in the Hague. He studied medicine in Leiden under Hermann Boerhaave, and in 1754 went to the University of Vienna, where he became head of its medical clinic...

 (1704–1776) at the Vienna clinic. In Vienna he worked closely with Leopold Auenbrugger

Leopold Auenbrugger

Josef Leopold Auenbrugger or Leopold von Auenbrugg , Austrian physician who invented percussion as a diagnostic technique. On the strength of this discovery, he is considered one of the founders of modern medicine.-Biography:Auenbrugger was a native of Graz in Styria, an Austrian province...

 (1722–1809) and Anton von Störck

Anton von Störck

Anton von Störck was an Austrian physician who was a native of Saulgau in Upper Swabia. Both of Störck's parents died when he was young, and he spent his early years as an orphan in a Viennese poorhouse. He studied medicine under Gerard van Swieten in Vienna, and received his degree in 1757...

 (1731–1803). One of Stoll's better known students was phrenologist Franz Joseph Gall

Franz Joseph Gall

Franz Joseph Gall was a neuroanatomist, physiologist, and pioneer in the study of the localization of mental functions in the brain.- Life :...

 (1758–1828).

Stoll is remembered for his epidemiological

Epidemiology

Epidemiology is the study of health-event, health-characteristic, or health-determinant patterns in a population. It is the cornerstone method of public health research, and helps inform policy decisions and evidence-based medicine by identifying risk factors for disease and targets for preventive...

 and systematic approach to medicine. He stressed the importance of knowing the clinical details of a patient's history, and installed the practice of keeping daily progress records of patients. He also developed a system of classifying diseases that was similar to the nosology of Thomas Sydenham

Thomas Sydenham

Thomas Sydenham was an English physician. He was born at Wynford Eagle in Dorset, where his father was a gentleman of property. His brother was Colonel William Sydenham. Thomas fought for the Parliament throughout the English Civil War, and, at its end, resumed his medical studies at Oxford...

 (1624–1689). Stoll was one of the first practitioners of Auenbrugger's percussion

Percussion (medicine)

Percussion is a method of tapping on a surface to determine the underlying structure, and is used in clinical examinations to assess the condition of the thorax or abdomen. It is one of the four methods of clinical examination, together with inspection, palpation and auscultation...

 methodology, and in 1777 is credited with providing the first description of gall bladder cancer

Cancer

Cancer , known medically as a malignant neoplasm, is a large group of different diseases, all involving unregulated cell growth. In cancer, cells divide and grow uncontrollably, forming malignant tumors, and invade nearby parts of the body. The cancer may also spread to more distant parts of the...

.

Stoll was a popular lecturer, and is considered an important figure in the "Old Vienna School" of medicine, a group that included Auenbrugger, Störck, Gerard van Swieten

Gerard van Swieten

Gerard van Swieten was a Dutch-Austrian physician.Van Swieten was born in Leiden. He was a pupil of Hermann Boerhaave and became in 1745 the personal physician of the Austrian Empress Maria Theresa. In this position he implemented a transformation of the Austrian health service and medical...

(1700–1772), et al.