Synonyms
Digitalis poisoning;
First describer
The cardiac efficacy of Digitalis was mentioned in the Papyrus Ebers as early as 1500 BCE. In the course of the Middle Ages, however, traces of a specific therapeutic use are lost.
In Ireland, the first references to the medicinal plant can be found around 400 to 500 CE, where it was used by herbalists for various indications. From there it reached mainland Europe, where it was first given its present name "digitalis" (foxglove) by the botanist Leonhard Fuchs in 1542.
At the end of the 18th century, the Scottish physician William Withering made a name for himself with his exact characterizations regarding the effects of digitalis, thus opening the era of scientific treatment with digitalis (Rietbrock 2013). He successfully treated patients with "cardiac dropsy" with a tea made from digitalis leaves (Hein 2020).
Homolle, a French physician and chemist, isolated three different substances from digitalis leaves in1864. The crystallized digitalin was first named "digitoxin" by the Strasbourg pharmacologist Schmiedeberg in 1874.The other two pure substances were later given the names "digoxin" and "gitoxin." Digoxin later gave rise to the albsynthetic derivatives acetyldigoxin and methyldigoxin (Rietbrock 2013).