Alfred Schittenhelm

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Alfred Schittenhelm (born October 16, 1874 in Stuttgart , † December 27, 1954 in Rottach-Egern ) was a German internist and university professor.

Live and act

Alfred Schittenhelm was the son of the Oberregierungsrat Wilhelm Schittenhelm (1838-1894) and his wife Julie born. Hauck. He attended high schools in his hometown and Heilbronn . After graduating from high school, he studied medicine from 1892 at the Eberhard Karls University of Tübingen , the University of Geneva and the University of Breslau . Since the winter semester 1892/93 he was a member of the Igel Academic Association in Tübingen . In Tübingen he completed his studies with a state examination in 1898 and was awarded a Dr. med. PhD . He subsequently spent his internship at the Karl Olga Hospital in Stuttgart , the Medical Clinic in Breslau, the Chemical Institute of the Charité in Berlin and the Medical Clinic in Göttingen. He completed his habilitation in internal medicine in 1904 and then worked as a clinic assistant at the Charité.

From 1907 he was an associate professor for clinical propaedeutics and history of medicine at the University of Erlangen. In 1912 he was appointed to the chair of internal medicine at the Albertus University in Königsberg , where he was director of the medical clinic. In 1915 he followed a call to the Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel , where he worked as full professor of internal medicine and clinic director until 1934. After the outbreak of World War I , he took part in the war as a medical officer, hygienist and medical consultant with the German Army . Schittenhelm promoted the development of a modern medical clinic in Kiel. After he had turned down appointments to Leipzig, Berlin and Vienna, he switched to the chair of internal medicine at the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich in 1934 and headed the 2nd medical clinic there.

After the Reichstag election in March 1933 , he joined the National Socialist German Workers' Party in May 1933 ( membership number 2.732.711). Later he also became a member of the Schutzstaffel (SS-No. 259.429), where he achieved the rank of SS-Standartenführer in September 1938 . Furthermore, he joined the NS-Ärztebund and the NS-Dozentbund and belonged to the leadership of the latter from 1944. In the clinic he ran, he had a department for "genetic maintenance and genetic research" set up in 1934/35, which remained meaningless and was dissolved after four years. In this context, he received funding from the German Research Foundation for the creation of a “card index of families with inherited diseases, as well as a relevant film and image archive”. He chaired the Scientific Committee of the Bioclimatic Working Group and had been co-editor of the Münchner Medizinische Wochenschrift since 1912 . Due to the war, the Munich clinic was relocated to Rottach in 1944.

After the end of the war he was released from the university office and held in the Moosburg internment camp. After a trial chamber , he was denazified as a fellow traveler and released from internment at the end of 1947. As a result of his efforts, he was reappointed professor in 1949. The following year he retired and then lived in Rottach-Egern with full retirement benefits. Since 1925 he was with Gertrud geb. Lienau (* 1900) married. The couple had three children.

Schittenhelm researched in particular the metabolism, the clinic of infections, blood diseases and medical climatology.

“S [chittenhelm] exemplarily embodies the dilemma of the internationally leading German medicine up to the Nazi regime. Instead of exile, he chose fellowship and, after the end of the war, restored his previous status. S [chittenheim] can be regarded as one of the last universal German clinicians of the 20th century, whose influence had a major impact on clinical and practical medicine in Germany until 1950. He still surveyed the entire internal medicine and published numerous papers within 45 years on almost all clinical-internal, but also experimental medical topics. "

- Eberhard J. Wormer

While the Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel had still awarded Schittenhelm the honorary senator title in 1951, the Academic Senate of the university took the decision in 2016 to revoke this dignity posthumously. According to research by Karl-Werner Ratschko and a group led by Oliver Auge and Norbert Luttenberger from Kiel and the medical historians Hans-Georg Hofer and Ralf Forsbach from Münster, Schittenhelm was "one of the most politically burdened German internists at all". In 1933, he had dismissed the chairman of the German Society for Internal Medicine (DGIM), Leopold Lichtwitz , because of his Jewish descent and benefited from his resignation when he - actually only elected for 1934 - took over the chairmanship of the DGIM in 1933. Then he had the DGIM needlessly self same circuit out. Schittenhelm's policy within the DGIM was anti-Semitic and völkisch , and accordingly he chose racial hygiene and genetic biology as the focus of the DGIM congresses . Schittenhelm was "guilty of being a scientist, functionary and active member of the NSDAP and SS during the Nazi era". The previous Schittenhelmstraße was renamed on October 31, 2016 by the city of Kiel, the Christian-Albrechts-University and its medical faculty and the University Medical Center Schleswig-Holstein in honor of Rosalind Franklin , a discoverer of the DNA structure and a pioneer of molecular genetic medicine.

Honors and memberships

Fonts (selection)

  • A case of complete agenesis of the forebrain, midbrain, and diencephalon. Mitzlaff, Rudolstadt 1898 (dissertation, University of Tübingen, 1898).
  • with Theodor Brugsch : Textbook of clinical examination methods for students and doctors. Urban & Schwarzenberg, Berlin 1908; 5th edition 1921: Textbook of clinical diagnostics and investigation methodology ; 6th edition 1923.
  • with Theodor Brugsch: The nucleus metabolism and its disorders. Fischer, Jena 1910.
  • with Julius Schmid: Gout and its therapy with special consideration of dietetics. Marhold, Halle 1910.
  • with Wolfgang Weichardt: The endemic goiter. With special consideration of the occurrence in the Kingdom of Bavaria. Springer, Berlin 1912.
  • Protein degradation, anaphylaxis and internal secretion , in: Dt. med. Wschr. 38, 1912, pp. 489-94.
  • ed. with Theodor Brugsch: Clinical Laboratory Technology. 4 volumes. 2nd Edition. Urban & Schwarzenberg, Berlin 1923/29.
  • (Ed.) Textbook of X-ray diagnostics. 2 volumes. Springer, Berlin 1924.
  • (Ed.) Handbook of the diseases of the blood and the blood-forming organs. Hemophilia, hemoglobinuria, hematoporphyria. 2 volumes. Springer, Berlin 1925.
  • Other internal indications. In: Reichsärztekammer (Hrsg.): Guidelines for termination of pregnancy and sterility for health reasons. Edited by Hans Stadler. J. F. Lehmanns Verlag, Munich 1936, pp. 104-113.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Hedgehog Directory 1871–1983. P. 35.
  2. ↑ a b Ernst Klee: The dictionary of persons on the Third Reich . 2nd Edition. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2007, p. 537.
  3. ↑ Excerpt from the seniority list of the SS
  4. ↑ a b c d e f g h i Eberhard J. Wormer :  Schittenhelm, Alfred. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 23, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-428-11204-3 , p. 15 f. ( Digitized version ).
  5. ↑ Ernst Klee: Auschwitz, Nazi medicine and its victims. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 1997, p. 70
  6. ↑ Heinz Goerke : The medical faculty from 1472 to the present. In: Laetitia Boehm, Johannes Spörl (Ed.): The Ludwig Maximilians University in its faculties. Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1972, p. 265.
  7. ↑ a b Boris Pawlowski: Academic Senate deprives Alfred Schittenhelm of honorary senator status. Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel, press release from May 12, 2016 from Informationsdienst Wissenschaft (idw-online.de), accessed on May 12, 2016.
  8. ↑ “Schittenhelmstraße” is renamed “Rosalind-Franklin-Straße” - press release no. 359/2016 of October 31, 2016 from Christian-Albrechts-Universität
personal data
SURNAME Schittenhelm, Alfred
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German internist and university professor
DATE OF BIRTH October 16, 1874
PLACE OF BIRTH Stuttgart
DATE OF DEATH December 27, 1954
Place of death Rottach-Egern