Staff profile

Andreas-Holger Maehle was born on 9 April 1957 in Siegen, Germany. He studied Medicine at the University of Bonn (1976-83), was awarded a Dr. med. (Bonn, 1983), served as a military medical officer (1983-84) and was an assistant at the Institute for the History of Medicine, University of Göttingen (1984-1990). He received his habilitation and venia legendi in History of Medicine with the Medical Faculty, Göttingen (1990) and served as Lecturer in History of Medicine, University of Göttingen (1990-91). Moving to England, he was a Wellcome Trust Research Fellow at the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine, University College London (1991-94) and a Wellcome Trust University Award Holder and Research Fellow at Durham University (1994-96). He received his Ph.D. from University College London in 1996 and went on to be Reader in History of Medicine, Durham University (1996-2000). Since 2000 he has been Professor of History of Medicine and Medical Ethics, Department of Philosophy, Durham University, and 2001-2023 in addition Director of the Centre for the History of Medicine and Disease, Wolfson Research Institute, Durham University. He served on the advisory board of the journal Gesnerus until 2020 and was until 2018 a member of the editorial board of the journal Medical History. He is a Member of the American Association for the History of Medicine. He is the author of 6 monographs: 'Johann Jakob Wepfer (1620-1695) als Toxikologe' (Verlag Sauerlaender 1987), 'Kritik und Verteidigung des Tierversuchs: Die Anfaenge der Diskussion im 17. und 18. Jahrhundert' (Franz Steiner Verlag 1992), 'Drugs on Trial: Experimental Pharmacology and Therapeutic Innovation in the Eighteenth Century' (Rodopi 1999), 'Doctors, Honour and the Law: Medical Ethics in Imperial Germany (Palgrave Macmillan 2009), 'Contesting Medical Confidentiality: Origins of the Debate in the United States, Britain, and Germany' (University of Chicago Press 2016), and 'A Short History of British Medical Ethics' (Ockham Publishing 2021). With Cay Pruell and Robert Halliwell he co-authored 'A Short History of the Drug Receptor Concept' (Palgrave Macmillan 2009). With Lutz Sauerteig he edited a special issue of Medical History (vol. 56/2, 2012) on Albert Moll, and with Heather Wolffram a special issue of the Royal Society journal Notes and Records on the history of hypnotism (vol. 71/2, 2017).

His current research is on medical psychology and psychoanalysis in the 19th and early 20th centuries for a new book 'Freud's Berlin Rival: Albert Moll and his Psychology' with McGill-Queen's University Press.

OFFICE HOURS: Mondays, 1.00 - 4.00 pm, room 202, 50/51 Old Elvet.

• ethical issues in the history of medicine
• history of medicine and the life sciences
• history of pharmacology
• history of psychoanalysis
• history of stem cell research

• 2018: Royal Society of Medicine: Fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine
• 2018: Gesnerus: Member of Scientific Committee of Gesnerus: Swiss Journal of the History of Medicine and Sciences
• 2018: AAHM: Member of the American Association for the History of Medicine
• 2018: Medical History: Member of the Editorial Board of Medical History
• 2016: Notes and Records Royal Society: Member of the Editorial Board of Notes and Records: The Royal Society Journal of the History of Science

Authored book

• Maehle, A. (2021). A Short History of British Medical Ethics. Ockham Publishing
• Maehle, A. (2016). Contesting Medical Confidentiality: Origins of the Debate in the United States, Britain, and Germany. The University of Chicago Press
• Pruell, C., Maehle, A., & Halliwell, R. (2009). A Short History of the Drug Receptor Concept. Palgrave Macmillan
• Maehle, A. (2009). Doctors, Honour and the Law: Medical Ethics in Imperial Germany. Palgrave Macmillan

Chapter in book

• Maehle, A. (2011). Medical Ethics and the Law. In M. Jackson (Ed.), The Oxford Handbook of the History of Medicine (543-560). Oxford University Press
• Maehle, A. (2010). Eine Kultur der Ehre: Ärztliche Berufsethik im Deutschen Kaiserreich zwischen Moral und Recht. In W. Bruchhausen, & H. Hofer (Eds.), Ärztliches Ethos im Kontext : Historische, phänomenologische und didaktische Analysen (59-73). Bonn University Press
• Maehle, A., & Troehler, U. (2009). The Discourses of Practitioners in Nineteenth- and Twentieth-Century Germany. In R. B. Baker, & L. B. McCullough (Eds.), The Cambridge World History of Medical Ethics (432-438.). Cambridge University Press
• Maehle, A. (2009). The Ethics of Experimenting on Animal Subjects. In R. B. Baker, & L. B. McCullough (Eds.), The Cambridge World History of Medical Ethics (552-557.). Cambridge University Press
• Maehle, A. (2002). The Emergence of Medical Professional Ethics in Germany. In A. Maehle, & J. Geyer-Kordesch (Eds.), Historical and Philosophical Perspectives on Biomedical Ethics. From Paternalism to Autonomy? (37-48). Ashgate Publishing
• Maehle, A. (2001). Zwischen medizinischem Paternalismus und Patientenautonomie: Albert Molls ‘Aerztliche Ethik’ (1902) im historischen Kontext. In A. Frewer, & J. Neumann (Eds.), Medizingeschichte und Medizinethik. Kontroversen und Begruendungsansaetze 1900-1950 (44-56). Campus

Edited book

• Maehle, A., & Geyer-Kordesch, J. (Eds.). (2002). Historical and Philosophical Perspectives on Biomedical Ethics. From Paternalism to Autonomy?. Ashgate Publishing

Journal Article

• Gijbels, J., Lancaster, C., Maehle, A., & Vander Hulst, R. (2022). Aligning Faith with Medicine: Medical Ethics, Reproduction and Catholic Morality in Francophone and Anglophone Normative Literature, c. 1840–1960. Journal of Religious History, 46(3), 439-459. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9809.12871
• Maehle, A. (2020). Beyond Professional Self-Interest: Medical Ethics and the Disciplinary Function of the General Medical Council of the United Kingdom, 1858-1914. Social History of Medicine, 33(1), 41-56. https://doi.org/10.1093/shm/hky072
• Maehle, A. (2017). A Dangerous Method? The German Discourse on Hypnotic Suggestion Therapy around 1900. Notes and Records: The Royal Society Journal of the History of Science, 71(2), 197-211. https://doi.org/10.1098/rsnr.2017.0006
• Maehle, A. (2015). Preserving Confidentiality or Obstructing Justice? Historical Perspectives on a Medical Privilege in Court. Journal of medical law and ethics, 3(1-2), 91-108. https://doi.org/10.7590/221354015x14319325750151
• Maehle, A. (2014). The powers of suggestion: Albert Moll and the debate on hypnosis. History of Psychiatry, 25(1), 3-19. https://doi.org/10.1177/0957154x13500596
• Maehle, A. (2013). Four early clinical studies to assess the effects of Peruvian bark. Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, 106(4), 150-155. https://doi.org/10.1177/0141076813482256
• Maehle, A. (2012). 'God's Ethicist': Albert Moll and His Medical Ethics in Theory and Practice. Medical History, 56(2), 217-236. https://doi.org/10.1017/mdh.2011.34
• Maehle, A. (2011). Ambiguous cells: the emergence of the stem cell concept in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Notes and Records: The Royal Society Journal of the History of Science, 65(4), 359-378. https://doi.org/10.1098/rsnr.2011.0023
• Maehle, A. (2011). Doctors in Court, Honour, and Professional Ethics: Two Scandals in Imperial Germany. Gesnerus, 68(1), 61-79
• Maehle, A. (2010). 'Patient trade' in Germany: an ethical issue at the practitioner-clinician interface in 1909 and 2009. Medical Humanities, 36(2), 84-87. https://doi.org/10.1136/jmh.2010.004655
• Maehle, A., & Pranghofer, S. (2010). Medical confidentiality in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries: an Anglo-German comparison. Medizinhistorisches Journal, 45(2), 189-221
• Maehle, A. (2009). A binding question: the evolution of the receptor concept. Endeavour, 33(4), 134-139. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.endeavour.2009.09.001
• Pranghofer, S., & Maehle, A. (2006). Limits of professional secrecy: medical confidentiality in England and Germany in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Interdisciplinary Science Reviews, 31(3), 231-244. https://doi.org/10.1179/030801806x113766
• Maehle, A. (2005). The Quantification and Differentiation of the Drug Receptor Theory, c. 1910-1960. Annals of Science, 62(4), 479-500. https://doi.org/10.1080/00033790412331312666
• Maehle, A. (2004). 'Receptive Substances': John Newport Langley (1852-1925) and his Path to a Receptor Theory of Drug Action *. Medical History, 48(2), 153-174
• Maehle, A. (2004). Historische Grundlagen des Rezeptor-Konzepts in der Pharmakologie *. Gesnerus, 61(1-2), 57-76
• Maehle, A. (2003). Protecting Patient Privacy or Serving Public Interests? Challenges to Medical Confidentiality in Imperial Germany. Social History of Medicine, 16(3), 383-401. https://doi.org/10.1093/shm/16.3.383
• Pruell, C., Maehle, A., & Halliwell, R. (2003). Drugs and Cells – Pioneering the Concept of Receptors
• Maehle, A. (2003). Aerztlicher Eingriff und Koerperverletzung: Zu den historisch-rechtlichen Wurzelln des Informed Consent in der Chirurgie, 1892-1940. Würzburger medizinhistorische Mitteilungen, 22, 178-187
• Maehle, A., Pruell, C., & Halliwell, R. (2002). The Emergence of the Drug Receptor Theory. Nature Reviews Drug Discovery, 1(8), 637-641. https://doi.org/10.1038/nrd875