LOO'MIS, ALFRED LERBEVS ( 1831-93 ) An American physician. Born at Itennington, Vt., he was graduated (rain Union college in 1851. He studied medicine at the College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York. and was graduated in 1852. At this time the science of auscultation and per cussion was developing very rapidly; and this circumstance, with perhaps the additional reason that he himself had a tuberculous tendency, led him to adopt diseases of the lungs and heart as his specialty. He was appointed visiting physi cian to Bellevue hospital in 1859, and became lecturer on physical diagnosis at the College of Physicians and Surgeons in 1862. Shortly after this his health broke down completely, and he spent six months in the Adirondaeks. The bene fit derived from his residence there led to the establishment. years later, of the sanatorium at Saranac and the hospital for Consumptives at Liberty, N. Y. In 1S66 he became professor of theory and practice of medicine at the Univer sity of the City of New York, with which institu tion he was identified for the rest of his life.
In five years Loomis had become the virtual head of the .Medical School of the University, and in ten years he had lifted it to the highest degree of prosperity it had ever known. His energy. skill, and reputation as a. teacher refilled the students' benches, and pupils came to him from all parts of the United States. His services to the New York Academy of Medicine were no less notable. Professor Loomis was appointed visit ing physician to Mount Sinai Hospital in 1874; was president of the New York Academy of Medi cine in 1889-90. and again in 1891-92. llc pub lished Lessons in Physical Diagnosis (New York. 1870); Lectures On rerci'S (ib., 1877) ; and A Text-Book of practical Medicine (ib., 1884). He was, in addition, editor of An American System, of Medicine (Philadelphia, 1894).