Wanda Błeńska

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Wanda Błeńska

Wanda Maria Błeńska (born October 30, 1911 in Poznan ; † November 27, 2014 there ) was a Polish doctor and missionary who cared for lepers in Uganda .

Life

After the early death of her mother, Wanda and her father, Teofil, came to Thorn in 1920 , where she completed elementary school lessons externally. Wanda Błeńska attended the girls' high school in Thorn, studied medicine at the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan and was active in the Academic Mission Circle. After graduating, she worked in the municipal hospital in Thorn from 1934 to 1936, then in the hygiene institute there and in 1939 in the maritime hospital in Gdynia . During the Second World War she was a lieutenant in the Polish Home Army as a commander of the women's department of the Thorner district in the underground.

After the end of the war she headed the Thorn Municipal Hospital. From 1945 to 1946 she worked at the Hygiene Institute and the Medical Academy in Gdansk. In 1946 she went to her brother in Hanover and studied tropical medicine there. In 1948 she continued her studies at Liverpool University.

From 1951 to 1994 she worked in a leprosy clinic of the Irish Franciscan Order (Little Sisters of St. Francis) in Buluba on Lake Victoria in Uganda . From 1951 to 1983 she was their main doctor, and for fifteen years she was the only doctor in the facility that now bears her name ("Buluba Leprosy Center, The Wanda Blenska Training Center").

In 1955 she was the first woman to climb the Vittorio Emanuele summit (4890 m) in the Ruwenzori Mountains . In 1993, at the age of 82, she returned to her Polish hometown of Poznan. She was awarded the Commander's Cross with Star of the Polonia Restituta Order in 1993 and the Grand Cross of the same order in 2011. She was also the holder of the Papal New Year's Eve Order and the Polish Order of Smiles , an honorary doctorate from the University of Poznan and an honorary citizen of Poznan and Uganda.

Maria Błeńska died on November 27, 2014 at the age of 103 in her native Poznan.

literature

  • Małgorzata Nawrocka: Jej światło. O życiu i dzielen Wandy Błeńskiej (Your Light. On the Life and Work of Wanda Błeńska): Poznań 2005, p. 176. ISBN 83-88572-17-2
  • Jerzy Woy-Wojciechowski: Misjonarze zdrowia (Missionaries of Health): Przewodnik Lekarski 2010; 2: 16-20

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Never żyje dr Wanda Błeńska - lekarka i misjonarka, zwana "matką trędowatych". Miała 103 lata. In: TVN24 , November 27, 2014 (Polish, accessed November 27, 2014).
personal data
SURNAME Błeńska, Wanda
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Błeńska, Wanda Maria (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Polish doctor and missionary
DATE OF BIRTH October 30, 1911
PLACE OF BIRTH Poses
DATE OF DEATH November 27, 2014
Place of death Poses