The New International Encyclopædia/Pfeufer, Karl von

PFEUFER, pfoi'fẽr, Karl von (1806-69). A German physician who introduced the rational method of physical and chemical explanations for physiological or pathological conditions. He was born at Bamberg, and studied medicine at Erlangen and Würzburg. After eight years of practice in Munich, Pfeufer held academic positions in Zurich (1840-44), in Heidelberg (1844-52), and in Munich (1852-69). Besides his great contributions to method, which appeared in the Zeitschrift für rationelle Medizin (1844 sqq.), he wrote on cholera, Zum Schutz wider die Cholera (1849; 3d ed. 1854), and introduced public sanitation as a requisite in medical study. Consult Kerschensteiner, Leben und Wirken des Dr. Karl von Pfeufer (Augsburg, 1871).