Rahel Hirsch (1870-1953). The first female Prussian medical professor

Dr. Rahel Hirsch was only the second woman to attain a professional medical position at the Charite Hospital in Berlin. For more than 16 years, she wo rked in Clinic II Internal Medicine. In 1906, she discovered that solid par ticles are able to pass from the veins and arteries into urine (Hirsch-Effe ct). The results of her investigation were severely criticized, the result of which was that she had to give up her position. In 1913 however she beca me the first woman to be named Professor of Medicine in Prussia. Many years later, she gave up her position and established a private practice in the Berlin district of Wilmersdorf. Under the Nazis, she found it increasingly difficult to work; in early October 1938 she left Germany head over heals a nd fled to England, where she remained until her death on October 6th, 1953 . Not permitted to practice in London, she underwent a serious crisis. When she died, she was impoverished. More than a decade later, she was posthumo usly admitted into the "Galerie of famous Jewish scientists." Her discovery , which had been so greatly criticized, was named after her.