Georges Bardet was a French

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 physician

Physician

A physician is a health care provider who practices the profession of medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring human health through the study, diagnosis, and treatment of disease, injury and other physical and mental impairments...

 who is known for first describing a rare genetic disease. In his graduation thesis at the University of Paris

University of Paris

The University of Paris was a university located in Paris, France and one of the earliest to be established in Europe. It was founded in the mid 12th century, and officially recognized as a university probably between 1160 and 1250...

 in 1920, Bardet wrote about a medical condition characterized by obesity

Obesity

Obesity is a medical condition in which excess body fat has accumulated to the extent that it may have an adverse effect on health, leading to reduced life expectancy and/or increased health problems...

, retinitis pigmentosa

Retinitis pigmentosa

Retinitis pigmentosa is a group of genetic eye conditions that leads to incurable blindness. In the progression of symptoms for RP, night blindness generally precedes tunnel vision by years or even decades. Many people with RP do not become legally blind until their 40s or 50s and retain some...

, polydactyly

Polydactyly

Polydactyly or polydactylism , also known as hyperdactyly, is a congenital physical anomaly in humans, dogs, and cats having supernumerary fingers or toes....

 and hypogonadism

Hypogonadism

Hypogonadism is a medical term for decreased functional activity of the gonads. Low testosterone is caused by a decline or deficiency in gonadal production of testosterone in males...

. Two years later, Hungarian physician Arthur Biedl

Arthur Biedl

Arthur Biedl was an Hungarian pathologist born in what today is Comloşu Mic, Romania.He studied medicine at the University of Vienna, where in 1896 he received his habilitation...

 described the same symptoms in two sisters, separate from Bardet's findings. This condition has since become known as the Bardet-Biedl syndrome

Bardet-Biedl syndrome

The Bardet–Biedl syndrome is a ciliopathic human genetic disorder that produces many effects and affects many body systems. It is characterized principally by obesity, retinitis pigmentosa, polydactyly, mental retardation, hypogonadism, and renal failure in some cases.-Summary of the...

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