Washoe County Library System

"The vivid biography of two pioneering sisters who, together, became America's first female doctors and transformed New York's medical establishment by creating a hospital by and for women. Elizabeth Blackwell believed from an early age that she was destined for greatness beyond the scope of "ordinary" womanhood. Though the world recoiled at the notion of a woman studying medicine, her intelligence and intensity won her the acceptance of the all-male...

A biography of the first woman doctor in the United States.

"A biography of Virginia Apgar in the She Persisted series. There weren't many women who tried to become doctors when Virginia Apgar went to medical school--but she didn't let that stop her. After a professor discouraged from becoming a surgeon, she became an anesthesiologist instead and created the famous Apgar test to check the health of newborn babies. It's a test that's still used in hospitals across the world today! "--

"In 1974, a young doctor arrived at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention with one goal in mind: to help eradicate smallpox. The only woman physician in her class in the Epidemic Intelligence Service, a two-year epidemiology training program, Mary Guinan soon was selected to join India's Smallpox Eradication Program, which searched out and isolated patients with the disease. By May of 1975, the World Health Organization declared Uttar Pradash...

"A heart-wrenching and provocative memoir about how the essential parts of one young woman's early life--her mother's work as a surgeon and her spiritual practice--led her to become a doctor and to question the premise that medicine exists to prolong life at all costs. Dr. Sunita Puri's parents grew up in urban India, in extreme poverty. Yet they managed not only to reach America, but her mother become a renowned anesthesiologist too. As a young girl,...

A biography of Mary Edwards Walker was one of the first women to receive a medical degree in the United States and went on to serve as a doctor to the Union soldiers during the Civil War. Her unconventional and determined life paved the way for generations of women in medicine and beyond.

A White House doctor who served during the administrations of George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush shares her insights into each president's personal life while describing her travels and treatments of visiting dignitaries.