Max Otten

Max Octavio Otten (born July 25, 1877 in Lima ( Peru ), † September 5, 1962 in Wernigerode ) was a doctor and one of the pioneers of occupational medicine .

Otten first attended the Spanish grammar school in his native Lima from 1884 to 1887. From 1887 to 1893 Otten, son of the merchant Alwin Otten, graduated from a French grammar school in Vevey ( Switzerland ) before he attended a grammar school in Detmold until 1896 , where he graduated from high school. In 1896 Otten began studying medicine in Leipzig . Further study locations were Göttingen and Halle (Saale) . In 1901 he passed the state examination and did his doctorate in Kiel . In 1901 Otten found a job as an assistant to Eugen F. Fraenkel and Hermann Lenhartz at the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf , where he stayed until 1907. Otten then became the first assistant to Moritz Heinrich Romberg in Tübingen . Here he was appointed private lecturer .

Otten then took over the management of the internal department of a Red Cross hospital in Tripolitania ( North Africa ) during the Turkish-Italian war in 1912 . Romberg then appointed him senior physician at the medical clinic in Munich . In 1916 he was appointed associate professor. During the First World War , Otten was the reserve naval staff doctor on the German side . In 1917 he went to Magdeburg and took over the management of the medical clinic at the Magdeburg-Altstadt Hospital, which he modernized. The main focus of the renewal was the ECG , gastroscopy , bacteriology and radiology . In addition, on July 1, 1927, Otten introduced an advice center for occupational diseases . A nursing internship for medical students was also introduced under his direction.

In 1931 he was given the position of hospital director. In 1932 he also took on the role of medical director at the Magdeburg-Sudenburg hospital. After the war ended in 1945, Otten became the epidemic commissioner for the state of Saxony-Anhalt in the same year . The advice center for occupational diseases was also reopened. On August 1, 1948, an ambulance and a clinical department for occupational diseases followed. With his participation, a nursing school was also founded in Magdeburg. With the end of the Second World War , Otten made a contribution to the reconstruction of the medical facilities that were badly damaged during the war. As early as 1952, the Magdeburg-Altstadt hospital again had 600 beds. Otten remained the hospital's director until 1955. Even after that, he held the position of head of the Magdeburg labor and medical inspection.

Otten, who was also a member of the Medical Society of Magdeburg , was awarded the Patriotic Order of Merit in silver during the GDR period and in 1954 with the title of Honored Doctor of the People . The Magdeburg Medical Academy appointed him an honorary senator. The city of Magdeburg named the street in front of the Magdeburg-Altstadt hospital as Max-Otten-Straße in his honor .

literature

• Ursula Schumann: Otten, Max. In: Guido Heinrich, Gunter Schandera (eds.): Magdeburg Biographical Lexicon, 19th and 20th centuries. Biographical lexicon for the state capital Magdeburg and the districts of Bördekreis, Jerichower Land, Ohrekreis and Schönebeck. Scriptum, Magdeburg 2002, ISBN 3-933046-49-1 .

Individual evidence

1. ^ Honor list of the "Merited Doctors of the People" 1954 , In: Neues Deutschland , December 12, 1954, p. 6