Ernst Bachstez (Bachstetz)

Born:	05-20-1888
Faculty:	Medical School | Medical University Vienna
Category:	Expelled teacher

Ernst BACHSTEZ (BACHSTETZ) (born on May 20th, 1888 in Baden near Vienna, died on August 11th, 1954 in Vienna) was academic lecturer ("Privatdozent") for ophtalmology at the Medical School of the University of Vienna. He was persecuted in times of Nazism as a Jew lost his position and was thrown out of the university on April 22nd, 1938. Bachstez attended the Schottengymnasium secondary school in Vienna and then studied medicine at the University of Vienna. During his studies he worked at the pathological-anatomical institute for two years under Weichselbaum, at the Neusser clinic for half a year and also for half a year at the Chvostek clinic. In 1912 he obtained his medical doctorate. After four months at the surgical department under Büdinger, he became operating surgeon under Dimmer at the 1st eye clinic in October 1912 and an assistant under Bernheimer and Meller on October 1st, 1913. Bachstez remained in this position until 1920, while taking part in the First World War from May to October 1915 as well as from December 1916 until the end of the war. He was head of the ophthalmological department in a field hospital as well as in a garrison hospital in Sarajevo. After the war he was named first assistant and then full assistant (1920), and habilitated for ophthalmology in 1922 with a paper on fatty degeneration of the cornea. In 1926 he began work as the head of the ophthalmological department at the Mariahilf hospital and held this position until 1938. After the “Anschluss”, on April 22nd, 1938, Bachstez’s venia was revoked for “important reasons of the public good”,[1] since he was considered a “Mischling 1. Grades” (“half-Jew”) according to the Nazi race doctrine.[2] Furthermore, he lost his job at the Mariahilf hospital, and the doctors’ society as well as the ophthalmological society rescinded his memberships. According to the Reich doctors’ registry he was able to continue working in his private clinic and ophthalmological doctor’s office - founded in 1920 - as of July 1st, 1939. His medical license was, however, suspended from August 20th, 1943, until at least March 1944.[3] After the end of the war, Bachstez returned to the University of Vienna, after the Staatsamt für Volksaufklärung (government office for public enlightenment) had reinstated his teaching license in August 1945.[4] He did not return to his position at the Mariahilf hospital, but he did work as a medical consultant at two municipal hospitals in Vienna. In the last years of his life, Bachstez suffered from an inner ear disease and, according to Merinsky, died after overcoming the sickness but returning to his work life too soon.[5] In his scientific work Bachstez mainly addressed the clinic and its problems, while also describing and explaining rare symptoms. His main focus was the neurology of the eye.[6]
Lit.: Federal Archives Berlin/Reichsärzteregister; Austrian State Archive/AVA, PA Bachstez; Archive of the University of Vienna/MED PA 22; MERINSKY 1980, 12-13; MÜHLBERGER 1993, 18; UB MedUni Wien/van Swieten Blog; PLANER 1929; TEICHL 1951.