Dr. Joseph Lister first used disinfectant in surgery on this day in 1865. As a professor of surgery at Glasgow University, Lister sought to remedy the massive numbers of patients dying from infection and blood poisoning by sterilizing operating procedures. He introduced carbolic acid to the operating room and insisted on clean operating clothes and disinfected instruments. Lister, considered by some to be eccentric because of his obsessive cleanliness, was awarded the Order ofMerit in 1902 for his medical advances.