Povijesni prilozi, Vol. 44 No. 68, 2025.
Original scientific paper
https://doi.org/10.22586/pp.v44i68.30510
Female Physicians and Pharmacists in Civil Croatia
Marko Kolić
Abstract
This paper focuses on the first female students of medicine and pharmacy – that is, the first women physicians and pharmacists to emerge in the territory of Civil Croatia (Banska Hrvatska) up to the year 1917. Although Croatian historiography has already produced several studies on early women physicians and pharmacists in this region, it lacks analyses aimed at identifying the factors that motivated these women to pursue studies in medicine and pharmacy. Likewise, there is a lack of research into their professional status and how their male colleagues responded to the emergence of women in a previously male-dominated field. The main goal of this study is to identify who the first women physicians and pharmacists were, where they were educated, and what their position was within the profession in Civil Croatia. The first part of the paper presents an analysis of the beginnings of higher education, followed by a discussion of the education of the earliest female doctors and pharmacists. The final section examines their roles and status within the profession. The research draws primarily on archival materials preserved in the Croatian State Archives and the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Zagreb, as well as on periodicals such as Liječnički vjesnik, Farmaceutski vjesnik, and Domaće ognjište, alongside the relevant scholarly literature and published sources.
Keywords
women physicians; women pharmacists; Civil Croatia; women’s history; history of science and medicine
Hrčak ID:
334546
URI
Publication date:
22.7.2025.
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