ABSTRACT
PIERRE FRANÇOIS RAYER was born at Saint Sylvain, March 7, 1793. He studied medicine in Paris and received his doctorate in 1818 with a thesis entitled Summary of a Brief History of Pathological Anatomy. Named a Physician to the Hospitals of Paris in 1824, he spent seven years at Saint Antoine, and then transferred to the Charité where he spent the remainder of his hospital career. In addition to his many scholastic honors Rayer became the personal physician to Louis Philippe and Louis Napoléon. By imperial edict, in 1862, he was appointed dean of the Paris Medical School, but bitter opposition by the student body and a number of the faculty to what they felt was arbitrary use of imperial prerogative forced him to resign in 1864, a humiliation from which he never recovered. His death was in 1867.
