(1841–1917), Swiss surgeon and Nobel laureate. Born in Bern, he was educated at the University of Bern. After earning his medical degree in 1865, he traveled and studied with several European surgeons. In England, he studied with Joseph Lister, whose principles on total asepsis (see ANTISEPTICS,) and antiseptic surgical procedures Kocher adopted and promoted throughout his career. He returned to Switzerland, where he was appointed professor of surgery and director of the surgical clinic at the University of Bern in 1872. He performed many types of surgery, devising many procedures, including the reduction of shoulder dislocations, and techniques for abdominal surgery, excision of the gall bladder, strangulated hernia, injuries and concussion of the brain, and trepanning.

Kocher also did research in biochemistry and bacteriology, and was an authority on the treatment of gunshot wounds. He wrote numerous treaties, notably on hernia in infancy and on epilepsy; his textbook on surgery (first published in 1894) was a standard and was widely translated. Kocher was most noted, however, for his research on the THYROID GLAND, (q.v.)—which he was the first (1876) to extirpate in cases of GOITER, (q.v.)—and his development of surgical techniques for correcting thyroid malfunctions. In 1883, after observing the development of a form of CRETINISM, (q.v.) in patients after total removal of the gland, he introduced the surgical practice (still used) of removing only a portion of the thyroid.

Kocher was awarded the 1909 Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine “for his work on the physiology, pathology, and surgery of the thyroid gland.”