Category: Women in Medicine
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Dr. Lucy Hobbs Taylor, DDS
Natalie Horakova Hradec Kralove, Czech Republic Lucy Hobbs Taylor. Photo via Kansas Historical Society Kansapedia. “I am a New Yorker by birth, but I love my adopted country—the West. To it belongs the credit of making it possible for women to be recognized in the dental profession on equal terms with men.” – Dr.…
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Alexa Canady, MD: The first Black woman neurosurgeon
Howard Fischer Uppsala, Sweden Dr. Alexa Canady. NIH Changing the Face of Medicine Exhibition. Via Wikimedia. Fair use. “Only a life lived for others is a life worthwhile.” – Albert Einstein Alexa Canady (b. 1950) was the daughter of Clinton Canady, Jr., DDS, and Elizabeth Canady, a civil rights activist and the first…
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Books, bangles, and bravado
Jill Kar New Delhi, India Figure 1. Anandi Gopal Joshi (March 31, 1865 – February 26, 1887). Via Wikimedia. Public domain. Anandibai Joshee (Anandi) set sail from India at the age of eighteen. Bartering her bangles for books, she traded convention for an education, which was considered shameful in nineteenth-century India.1 In doing so,…
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Dorothy Russell: The complete pathologist
Dorothy Stuart Russell. Photo via Todiramphus on Wikimedia. CC BY-SA 4.0. Nephrologists are familiar with Dorothy Russell because in 1930, long before renal biopsies, she published a monograph in which she classified cases of glomerulonephritis into mitis, intermedia, and gravis. But in the world at large she is better remembered for her research into cancer…
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Dr. Susan LaFlesche Picotte: tradition, assimilation, and healing
Mariel Tishma Chicago, Illinois, United States Fig 1. Susan La Flesche Picotte. 1889. Drexel University College of Medicine Legacy Center Archives & Special Collections. Published with permission. “My office hours are any and all hours of the day and night.” — Susan LaFlesche Picotte1 It was August of 1889 and Dr. Susan LaFlesche Picotte…
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Dr. Joycelyn Elders: An unwelcome prophet
Howard Fischer Uppsala, Sweden Joycelyn Elders, former U.S. Surgeon General. From the National Institutes of Health. Via Wikimedia. Public domain. “No prophet is welcome in his hometown.” — The Gospel of Saint Luke, 4:24. New American Standard Bible Joycelyn Elders, MD (b. 1933) was Surgeon General of the United States of America from…
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Women surgeons
Moustapha Abousamra Ventura, California, United States Cactus flower with buds.Image courtesy of the author. Last spring, I spent three months in the Texas Hill Country. It is a place that at once can be beautiful and hostile. The fields of blue bonnets in full bloom are breathtaking. The cacti that abound around barbed wire…
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Book review: The Doctors Blackwell
Elizabeth Coon Eelco Wijdicks Rochester, Minnesota, United States The Doctors Blackwell. Janice P. Nimura. Edith Lutzker celebrated the centennial anniversary of the struggle of five British heroines in her 1969 groundbreaking book Woman Gain A Place in Medicine. Much less has been written on women physicians in Europe and Asia, but the Italian universities…
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Mary Josephine Hannan: portrait of a pioneer
Katie King Atlanta, Georgia, United States Mary Hannan. Photograph by Cowell, Simla. Via the Wellcome Collection. Public Domain. Mary Josephine Hannan was an Irish medical pioneer, an outspoken woman with a strong sense of morality, a fervid supporter of women’s rights, and a champion of children and public health. She spent her life fighting…
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The life of a trailblazer: Ogino Ginko, one of the first female doctors in Japan
Mariel Tishma Chicago, Illinois, United States Photo of Ogino Ginko. From the National Diet Library. Via Wikimedia. Public domain. Ogino Ginko was Japan’s first female doctor of Western medicine. She lived a life full of struggles, achieved a flash of fame, and then quietly retreated into history. She advocated for the rights, safety, and…