Since at least 1860, this phrase has been used by physicians as a hallowed expression of hope, intention, humility, and recognition that human acts with good intentions may have unwanted consequences.
The origin of the phrase is uncertain. The Hippocratic Oath includes the promise "to abstain from doing harm" (Greek: ἐπὶ δηλήσει δὲ καὶ ἀδικίῃ εἴρξειν) but not the precise phrase. Perhaps the closest approximation in the Hippocratic Corpus is in Epidemics: "The physician must...have two special objects in view with regard to disease, namely, to do good or to do no harm" (Bk. I, Sect. 5, trans. Adams, Greek: ἀσκέειν, περὶ τὰ νουσήματα, δύο, ὠφελέειν, ἢ μὴ βλάπτειν).
According to Gonzalo Herranz, Professor of Medical Ethics at the University of Navarre, Primum non nocere was introduced into American and British medical culture by Worthington Hooker in his 1847 book, Physician and Patient. Hooker attributed it to the Parisian pathologist and clinician Auguste François Chomel (1788–1858), the successor of Läennec in the chair of medical pathology, and the preceptor of Pierre Louis. Apparently, the axiom was part of Chomel's oral teaching.
However, close examination reveals that Hooker did not use the specific expression or the traditional Latin phrase. A detailed investigation of the origins of the aphorism was reported by the clinical pharmacologist Cedric M. Smith in the April 2005 issue of the Journal of Clinical Pharmacology. It addresses the questions of the origin and chronology of appearance of the maxim. Rather than being of ancient origin as usually assumed, the specific expression, and its even more distinctive associated Latin phrase, has been traced back to an attribution to Thomas Sydenham (1624–1689) in a book by Thomas Inman (1860). The book by Inman, and his attribution, was reviewed by "H.H." in the American Journal of Medical Science in the same year. A prominent American surgeon, L.A. Stimson, used the expression in 1879 and again in 1906 (in the same journal). That it was in common use by the turn of the century is apparent from later mentions, such as by the prominent obstetrician J. Whitridge Williams in 1911, as well as detailed discussion of its use in a popular book authored by Dr. Morris Fishbein, the long-time editor of the Journal of the American Medical Association in 1930.
(Credit Wikipedia 2010)
