Willem Einthoven

Dutch physiologist

Fame58.6
Momentum0.4
Indonesia rank#123

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Fame58.6
Momentum0.4
Indonesia rank#123
Wikipedia3.5K

Lived 1860–1927, aged 67Indonesia

Indonesia ScientistsScientist

Wikipedia
75 languages
Cross-language footprint
Rank in Indonesia
#123
Scientists
Era
1860–1927
Aged 67
Awards
3
recognised works

Summary

Updated 2026-06-08

He made the heartbeat readable. Before Einthoven's electrocardiograph, the electrical rhythm of the heart was essentially invisible to medicine — a mystery physicians could only guess at through a stethoscope.

Biography

About

Willem Einthoven was born on 21 May 1860 in what is now Indonesia, trained as a medical doctor in the Netherlands, and turned his attention to physiology. In 1895 he invented the first practical electrocardiograph, a device that could record the heart's electrical activity with precision — transforming cardiology from educated guesswork into measurable science. The work earned him the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1924 "for the discovery of the mechanism of the electrocardiogram." He died on 29 September 1927, three years after the prize, having given doctors a way to see what had a…

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