Dario Maestrini


Dario Maestrini was a 20th-century Italian physiologist and scientist. He was noted in the national scientific community for his research on heart, in particular for the first formulation of the Frank-Starling law, known as "Legge del cuore" or "Legge di Maestrini" among Italian doctors.

Early life

Dario Maestrini was born on 23 March 1886 in Colle Umberto I, Corciano. His parents were Geremia Maestrini and Ester Monni. He was the first of three children.
At the high school he focused on classical studies and later enrolled at the University of Perugia to study veterinary medicine. During his time there he attended David Anxefeld’s Institute of Physiology and became his assistant. He graduated in 1912.
After this first degree Dario Maestrini decided to enter the University of Pisa for Medicine and Surgery where he graduated on 17 July 1914 with full marks.

Medical career

On 14 November 1916 he obtained a post as lector in physiology. During the First World War he enrolled at the army as medical officer and he directed different military hospitals on the front line near the rivers Isonzo and Piave.
Between 1919 and 1924 he worked at the University of Rome where he began an intense research activity, mainly on the heart. He highlighted some chemical and functional similarities between the muscle fiber cells of the ventricle of the heart and the skeletal flexor muscles. He discovered that in the walls of atria there were less contractile fibers than elastic and fibrous tissue. This causes the tendency of this part of the heart to dilate itself more than undergo hypertrophy.
Through experiments on frogs' and snails' hearts, he demonstrated the direct relationship between the volume of the blood in the heart chambers and the contractile energy. This studies permitted to formulate his "Legge del cuore", later known as Frank-Starling law.
From 1923 he decided to devote the rest of his career to hospital medicine. On 2 February 1925 he became chief physician of the Civil Hospital ″S. Antonio″ in Teramo, run by Congregazione di carità. Here Maestrini reorganized completely the structure of the hospital, creating a ward for people with tuberculosis. His hospital activity distinguished for his constant clinical and scientific dedication especially in the cardiological sector.
In 1934 a new Sanatorium was inaugurated in Teramo and Maestrini became the first hospital director, since he had shown great skills in phthisiology during his career. This hospital was the first built for the cure of the tuberculosis in the entire Abruzzo and its name, Alessandrini-Romualdi Sanatorium comes from the names of the people who donated their money in order to permit the realization of this structure.
In 1963 he introduced new and more suitable branches in the electrocardiogram practice to observe the function of the right heart. He named this ″right electrocardiogram".
He took part in the Medical Academy of Rome and he was president of the science section of the Science Academy of Rome.

The Law of the Heart

Between 1914 and 1915, Maestrini took part in a big scientific debate. Through experiments on the heart of snails and with a series of 19 observations on frog's heart, he was able to demonstrate the direct relationship between the volume of blood contained in the heart cavities and the contractile energy of the heart and consequently how, within certain limits, the lengthening of the heart fibers, cause of the dilatation of the heart, corresponds to a greater contractile energy. So he formulated his "Law of the Heart", challenging with valid arguments the conception of those who identified in the dilatation of the heart only a pathological event.
Three years later, in 1918, Ernest Starling came at the same conclusions, publishing in London ″The law of the heart″. The publication was based on the original article, written by Dario Maestrini in 1915 and published by magazine “Archivio di Farmacologia e Scienze Affini”, “L’influenza del peso sulla corrente d’azione e sul lavoro meccanico del muscolo cardiaco”. Since Starling had an important reputation in the international scientific community, this law was immediately known as Frank-Starling law and only in Italy it was called "Maestrini-Starling law".
Dario Maestrini knew that until the years 1914 and 1915, Starling had always supported theories diametrically opposed to the Maestrini ones. From 1915, however, he suddenly changed ideas and strongly claimed the theses published in the Italian magazine by Maestrini.
In 1923, on the advice of Silvestro Baglioni, director of the Institute of Physiology of the University of Rome, Maestrini wrote to Starling to claim the priority of the discovery. The response of the English physiologist was surprising. In a letter still kept by Maestrini’s family, Starling recognized that it wasn't the Italian scientist who first, in 1915, had shown a direct relationship between the length of the cardiac fiber and its contractile strength. Despite this the Frank-Starling law remained in the international scientific community always linked to the name of the English scholar.
In 1974 Maestrini's adopted son, Fulvio Pezza, head of oncology in Novara, sent to the prestigious English medical journal The Lancet a brief note entitled "The law of the heart" in which he claimed the priority of the discovery to Maestrini, as the same Starling had admitted. The letter was published in the medical journal on 23 November 1974.
In the last months of his life Maestrini gained the satisfaction of having solemnly recognized the priority of his discovery with two notes appeared in Pezza's article on The Lancet that proposed the definitive name of "Maestrini-Starling Law".

Personal life

During his stay on the front line near the river Isonzo as an Italian soldier, Dario Maestrini met Giuseppina Bauzon, a woman of the small town of Romans d'Isonzo. After the end of the war they got married and they had a daughter, Anna Maria, who died at the age of 21 years old.
On 1 January 1935 he became chief director of the Sanatorium Hospital of Gorizia. During his stay in this city he met and married the widow Caterina Bianchi and adopted her two children, Fulvio Pezza and Luisa Gobbi.
Dario Maestrini died on 28 October 1975, at the age of 89. He died in Arezzo, where he was buried. A care center for elderly people has been named in his honor.

Political engagement

Maestrini was involved in the anti-fascist movement. In 1943 he entered the National Liberation Committee and he was part of "Pio Borri" brigade.He became Health and Hygiene Alderman of the municipality of Arezzo in the first junta made up after the liberation on behalf of Action Party and in 1948 he was awarded the title of Patriot.

Main writings