Tag: History of Medicine
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Dorothy Russell: The complete pathologist
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 and neurologic diseases. Born in Sydney in 1895, Dorothy Stuart Russell…
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St. Fabiola and her hospital
In about AD 380, a wealthy patrician matron gave money for a hospital to be built in Portus, the ancient port of Rome. This hospital was one of the first of its kind in the western part of the Roman empire, designed to provide care for the multitude of poor people living in the capital.…
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Healer of the pharaohs: History’s first woman doctor
Matthew TurnerWashington, US Some 4500 years ago, as the great pyramids rose above the desert sands of Egypt, there lived a remarkable woman. Her name was Peseshet, and she is humanity’s first known woman physician. Peseshet was known by the title imy-r swnwt, which roughly translates to “Lady Overseer of the Lady Physicians.”1 She was…