Oskar Hirsch

Born:	11-14-1877
Faculty:	Medical School | Medical University Vienna
Category:	Expelled teacher

Oskar HIRSCH, born November 14, 1877 in Prerau, deceased April 20, 1965 in Boston, was a lecturer in laryngology and rhinology at the Medical School of the University of Vienna.

After having graduated as a medical doctor from the Medical School of the University of Vienna in 1902, he worked as an otorhinolaryngologist at the Rudolfs-Spital and at Vienna’s General Hospital. He was promoted to professor of laryngorhinology in 1914 and worked between 1915 and 1918 at the Finsterer surgical department of Vienna’s Garnisonsspital, 1919-1920 at the Neumann Ear Clinic and from 1920 onwards as head of the laryngology out-patients’ clinic of Kaiser-Franz-Josef hospital and at Jubilaeumsspital in Vienna. In 1927 he was awarded the title of associate professor. His scientific treatises dealt most notably with tumours of the pituitary gland and their removal through the nose, with the genesis and treatment of adenoids, as well as with facial sinusitis. Further points of interest of his were embryology and comparative anatomy. Under the national-socialist regime he was subjected to racial persecution, his venia legendi was invalidated and on April 22, 1938 he was divested of his office and banned from the University of Vienna. In November 1938, he managed to escape to Boston, Massachusetts, USA.

In Boston, Oskar Hirsch worked first at the ENT-department of the Boston City Hospital, subsequently became a consultant at Beth Israel, Chelsea Naval, New England Center, as well as the Children’s and Massachusetts General hospitals. He was granted American citizenship in 1944.

Lit.: MERINSKY 1980, 97-99; UB MedUni Wien/van Swieten Blog

Katharina Kniefacz