1760-1808

English physician who explored therapeutic uses of gas inhalation and befriended chemist Humphry Davy. After medical school in Edinburgh, Scotland, Beddoes returned to England to become one of the most popular professors in the history of Oxford University. However, his support of the American and French revolutions cost him a prestigious post at the university, so he resigned in 1792 and moved to Bristol to continue the research on gases he had begun at Oxford. In 1798 he opened the Medical Pneumatic Institute and hired a young Davy as research director. The research on gases ended in early 1800 in failure and public ridicule, but Davy left for London and a career as a great chemist. Beddoes was highly critical of the medical practice of his time and suggested numerous remedies, including more published case studies by physicians and better statistics by hospitals.