<P> Laparoscopy was used in the diagnosis of liver and gallbladder disease by Heinz Kalk in the 1930s . Hope reported in 1937 on the use of laparoscopy to diagnose ectopic pregnancy . In 1944, Raoul Palmer placed his patients in the Trendelenburg position after gaseous distention of the abdomen and thus was able to reliably perform gynecologic laparoscopy . </P> <P> Georg Wolf (1873--1938) a Berlin manufacturer of rigid endoscopes, established in 1906, produced the Sussmann flexible gastroscope in 1911 (Modlin, Farhadi - Journal of Clinical Gastroenterology, 2000). Karl Storz began producing instruments for ENT specialists in 1945 through his company, Karl Storz GmbH . </P> <P> Basil Hirschowitz and Larry Curtiss invented the first fiber optic endoscope in 1957 . Earlier in the 1950s Harold Hopkins had designed a "fibroscope" consisting of a bundle of flexible glass fibres able to coherently transmit an image . This proved useful both medically and industrially, and subsequent research led to further improvements in image quality . Further innovations included using additional fibres to channel light to the objective end from a powerful external source, thereby achieving the high level of full spectrum illumination that was needed for detailed viewing, and colour photography . </P> <P> The previous practice of a small filament lamp on the tip of the endoscope had left the choice of either viewing in a dim red light or increasing the light output - which carried the risk of burning the inside of the patient . Alongside the advances to the optics, the ability to' steer' the tip was developed, as well as innovations in remotely operated surgical instruments contained within the body of the endoscope itself . This was the beginning of "key - hole surgery" as we know it today . </P>

When was the first fiber optic endoscope introduced