Jacques Mathieu Delpech (1777-1832): orthopedic pioneer, orthomorphic inventor, in the Montpellier Medical School
Seance of wednesday 18 february 2026 (Napoléon et les chirurgiens)
DOI number : 10.26299/yz26-4c85/emem.2026.08.15
Abstract
Among the civil surgeons of the Napoleon 1er period, two names are predominant: Guillaume Dupuytren, very famous, and Jacques Mathieu Delpech, underestimated but in fact equal. Childhood and adolescence in Toulouse. Early engagement in French revolutionary Army Jacques Mathieu Delpech (JMD) was born in Toulouse on 1777 October 2th 1997, in a modest background. His father is a proofreader. When he was 12 years he learned anatomy, and when he was 14, he teached it. Noticed by Alexis Larrey for his dexterity, he engaged in 1793 in Army of the Pyrenees, as an operating surgeon in the battlefields. Medical studies and thesis in Montpellier JMD has to stop his military carrer after contracting a typhoid fever. He move to the Montpellier medical school and supports his thesis in 1801 in the field of gynecology and obstetrics: “Possibility and utility of symphysectomy”. In Paris during 10 years : under Alexis Boyer’s protection at the Emperor Household (1803-1812) Moving in Paris, JMD becomes an Alexis Boyer’s assistant and a famous surgeon working in the civil Emperor Household. In 1812, he presents his candidature for the operative medecine chair against other surgeons: Guillaume Dupuytren, Philibert Joseph Roux (Alexis Boyer’s son in law). Finaly Delpech withdraw his candidacy, at the requiest of Boyer. The same year, he stand for election at the Montpellier Surgical Clinic chair.
Professor at the Montpellier Medical School: excellent surgeon, innovative in medico surgical ktechnics. Dramatic death when he was 58 years of age (1812-1832)
JMD’s Works are important as well in the medical orthopaedic treatment as in the surgical field. He was the first surgeon to practice an Achille tendon tenotomy in clubfoot, to attach Pott’s pain and tuberculosis; he published about humerus fractures, length leg discrepancies, arterial aneurysms. Passionate about plastic and facial surgery he performed the first forehead flap in France sometimes associated with a rhinoplasty. Conservative orthopedic treatment is also for him an important center of interest and he realised in Montpellier the first rehabilitation center, particularly used in scoliosis treatment. In his work “About orthomorphy in human species”, published in 1828, JMD analyse etiology and treatment of important deformities. With reason, he prefers the term of orthomorphic (deformity correction) than orhopedic (children deformity correction), proposed by Nicolas Andry in 1741, which is for etymological reasons, adequate only in children.
JMD was killed, on 1832 october 29, by an imbalanced patient operated on some years before.
He was an excellent teacher, a surgeon with an exceptional dexterity, but also a man with multiple qualities: eloquence, generosity (he received sometimes his patients in his house for post operative cares, artistic gifts.
Professor at the Montpellier Medical School: excellent surgeon, innovative in medico surgical ktechnics. Dramatic death when he was 58 years of age (1812-1832)
JMD’s Works are important as well in the medical orthopaedic treatment as in the surgical field. He was the first surgeon to practice an Achille tendon tenotomy in clubfoot, to attach Pott’s pain and tuberculosis; he published about humerus fractures, length leg discrepancies, arterial aneurysms. Passionate about plastic and facial surgery he performed the first forehead flap in France sometimes associated with a rhinoplasty. Conservative orthopedic treatment is also for him an important center of interest and he realised in Montpellier the first rehabilitation center, particularly used in scoliosis treatment. In his work “About orthomorphy in human species”, published in 1828, JMD analyse etiology and treatment of important deformities. With reason, he prefers the term of orthomorphic (deformity correction) than orhopedic (children deformity correction), proposed by Nicolas Andry in 1741, which is for etymological reasons, adequate only in children.
JMD was killed, on 1832 october 29, by an imbalanced patient operated on some years before.
He was an excellent teacher, a surgeon with an exceptional dexterity, but also a man with multiple qualities: eloquence, generosity (he received sometimes his patients in his house for post operative cares, artistic gifts.