The Brothers of Mercy Hospital and Celestine Opitz

The Hospital of the Brethren of Mercy in Prague, Na Frantisku was built on the place, where a medieval hospital had been built in the middle of the 14th century. The Brethren of Mercy got into possession of the building in December 1620. Till the General hospital was built (1790) their hospital was the largest in Prague. Since the 2nd half of the 18th century the clinical education of the medicine students was held here. The Brother of Mercy Celestýn Opitz (1810-1866) was sent by the order to the Prague medical faculty, where he reached the magister of surgery in 1842. On February 7th, 1847 in the hospital Na Frantisku he was the first in Bohemia to apply the ether narcosis. In 1852 he graduated in Vienna to medicine doctor, but later he worked in the administration of his order.