After a few symptom-free years, chronic inflammatory changes can occur in practically all organs (skin, bones, blood vessels) if syphilis is not cured. Without effective therapy, one third of all patients were affected. The nodular and plate-like gummy granulomatous inflammations (gummae) can decay into ulcers and heal with scarring. Moulage No. 803 impressively shows this chronic, destructive progressive process on the skin.

Since syphilis can be treated with penicillin, such severe forms of syphilis have become so rare worldwide that they are slowly disappearing from medical memory. All the more significant today is the lifelike replica with the Moulage 803, which is a reminder of this diagnosis and helps to ensure that doctors still think of a syphilis infection in the case of incipient unclear nodular and scarring inflammations - especially since early penicillin therapy simply prevents the devastating late damage.

Today, we still read about the personal and social misery that used to be associated with a syphilis diagnosis. But only a replica like Moulage No. 803, which lets us look into the face of Alfred S. as if we were in 1939, enables us to feel the devastating extent of a syphilis infection. Suddenly we can understand why the patients were willing to undergo therapies with highly toxic drugs such as mercury, bismuth and arsenic (Salvarsan) that have been related with many severe side effects.!

 

Michael Geiges, Dermatologist, Director of the Moulagenmuseum, Univ. of Zürich - 26. 5. 2023

This wax moulage with the number 803 was fabricated in Zurich in 1939 by Lotte Volger (1883-1956). It shows the face of A. S., a male individual with syphilitic lesions on the skin of his face. The diagnostic label reads “Kleingummöse Lues III”, which means that this patient suffered from tertiary stage syphilis when Lotte Volger made a plaster cast of his face which she subsequently used to fabricate the wax moulage.

The moulage was in a somewhat fragile condition before conservation and restoration work was conducted. Several old cracks could be seen across the face. Although some of them had apparently been mended, there were still traces that were rather too clearly visible. Restoration work therefore included not only the cleaning of the moulage, but also some gluing and retouching of the old cracks.

For this kind of work, the conservator-restorer used an assortment of special instruments, age-resistant glues, and highly pigmented, light-fast colours. With the proper preventive conservation measures concerning storage, climate, handling, and light, this moulage is now ready to serve the interested public as well as countless medical students for at least another century.

Sabina Carraro, Conservator and restorer, Moulagenmuseum, University of Zurich