Journals
Backfiles
The Lancet Backfiles on ScienceDirect
Illuminating and advancing medical thought and practice since 1823:
- Coverage from volume 1, issue 1
- 390,000 full text searchable articles with HTML abstracts and reference linking
- Thousands of pages of research spanning 180 years, now available on ScienceDirect
Press Coverage
- BBC Online: Vast digital health archive opens
- Times Online: Lancet's 180 years of illness go online
- BBC Radio 4: Interview with Dr Richard Horton (71 kb)
- BMJ: Digital archive of Lancet is launched
The complete chronicle of more than 180 years of medical intelligence, with one click from your desktop. The Lancet Backfiles contains 390,000 historical articles that have affected the practice and science of medicine. Groundbreaking theories and discoveries that served to inform and reform medical thought and innovation are now available in electronic format – all fully searchable and interlinked with today’s top papers.
The Lancet Backfiles have published top articles which are now available online for the first time. Researchers will have Instant access to these examples of seminal and much-cited papers from earlier volumes:
- 1832
Malignant cholera: documents communicated by the Central Board of Health London, relative to the treatment of cholera by the copious injection of aqueous and saline fluids into the veins;
T. Latta
- Early example of IV therapy
- 1867
On a new method of treating compound fracture, abscess, etc., with observations on the conditions of suppuration
Joseph Lister
- 1867
On the antiseptic principle in the practice of surgery
Joseph Lister; ; 2:353-6, 668-669
- Lister's antiseptic principle
- 1937
Principles of medical statistics
A.B. Hill
- 1961
Thalidomide and congenital abnormalities
W.G. McBride
- This letter was the first item reporting to link thalidomide relation to birth defects
- 1961
A new synthetic penicillin PA-248
G.M. Williamson, J.K. Morrison and K.J. Stevens
- 1961
Clinical use of a new synthetic penicillin: PA-248
M. Nagley
- 1962
Thalidomide and congenital abnormalities
W. Lenz
- Early recognition of Thalidomide as the cause of limb malformation
- 1966
Chromosome analysis of human amniotic fluid cells
M. W. Steele and W. R. Breg Jr
- Chromosome analysis of human amniotic fluid cells
- 1973
Recognition of the fetal alcohol syndrome in early infancy
K.L. Jones and D.W. Smith
- Findings named Fetal Alcohol Syndrome
- 1976
Reimplantation of a human embryo with subsequent tubal pregnancy
P.C. Steptoe and R.G. Edwards
- First report of pregnancy of an unfertilised egg
- 1978
Transluminal dilatation of coronary-artery stenosis
A.R. Gruentzig
- First report of balloon angioplasty
- 1986
Effectiveness of intravenous thrombolytic treatment in acute myocardial infarction
Gruppo Italiano per lo Studio della Streptochinasi nell'Infarto Miocardico (GISSI)
- 1986
Randomised trial of intravenous atenolol among 16,027 cases of suspected acute myocardial infarction: ISIS-1
ISIS-1 Collaborative Group
- 1988
Randomised trial of intravenous streptokinase, oral aspirin, both, or neither among 17,187 cases of suspected acute myocardial infarction: ISIS-2
ISIS-2 (Second international Study on Infarct Survival) Collaborative Group
Note for librarians and users
Issue numbering of the earliest volumes of The Lancet in ScienceDirect does not always exactly reflect the numbering system that was used in their original paper equivalents published in the early-1800s. For continuity reasons and to ensure that the overview displays in the correct chronological order, we have had to extrapolate the numbering system from the 1840s back to 1823. The original issue numbers are stated as far as possible in explanatory messages underneath the issue number on the volume and issue journal browse page on ScienceDirect.
Pricing Information
Pricing information for all Backfiles is available on this website.