Saul Hertz

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Saul Hertz (born April 20, 1905 in Cleveland (Ohio) , † July 28, 1950 in Boston ) was an American physician, a pioneer of radioiodine therapy .

Saul Hertz 1940

Hertz was the son of a Jewish immigrant from Russia and a realtor. He studied at the University of Michigan ( bachelor's degree) and Harvard Medical School , where he received his MD degree in 1929 . This was followed by specialist training (internship, residency) at Mount Sinai Hospital in Cleveland . 1931 to 1943 he was head of the thyroid department (Thyroid Clinic and Hospital) at Massachusetts General Hospital . From 1943 he was in the Medical Corps of the US Navy and on the Manhattan Projectinvolved in research on the biological and medical application of nuclear physics. From 1946 to 1950 he was an instructor at Harvard Medical School and in 1946 he was the founder of the Radioactive Isotope Research Institute in Boston .

In 1937 Hertz began experiments with animals with radioactive iodine together with the physicist Arthur Roberts of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), which demonstrated the tracer properties of radioactive iodine. From 1941 he was also able to begin experiments on humans after the cyclotron at MIT was completed in 1940, with which iodine-130 and -131 were produced. January 1941 saw the first successful treatment of a patient with Graves' disease at Massachusetts General Hospital . The publication followed in 1946, which included 29 cases. She helped make this a standard of care in the United States.

Hertz also looked at other aspects of early nuclear medicine, including studying the treatment of thyroid cancer with radioactive isotopes.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ The Michigan Alumnus LIX, No. 3, Oct. 18, 1952, p. 204
  2. ^ Hertz Radioactive Iodine as an Indicator in Thyroid Physiology . In: American Journal of Physiology . 1940; Volume 128: pp. 565-576
  3. ^ Hertz, Roberts Radioactive Iodine in the Study of Thyroid Physiology VII: The use of radioactive iodine therapy in hyperthyroidism . In: Journal of the American Medical Association . 1946; Volume 131: pp. 81-86
personal data
SURNAME Hertz, Saul
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American medic
DATE OF BIRTH April 20, 1905
PLACE OF BIRTH Cleveland
DATE OF DEATH July 28, 1950
Place of death Boston