Philip S. Hench, MD Papers

Dr. Philip Showalter Hench was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania February 28, 1896. He died on vacation in Jamaica, March 30, 1965. He graduated from Lafayette College, Easton, Pennsylvania, at the age of 20 and entered the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. He completed his medical studies in 1920 and in 1921 became a fellow at the Mayo Graduate School of Medicine of the University of Minnesota. He was appointed faculty member at the Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota, in 1925. In 1926 he was appointed head of the new section on rheumatic diseases. In 1953 he became a senior consultant of the Mayo Clinic. He retired from the Mayo Clinic and Mayo Graduate School of Medicine in 1957. Find out more from Philip S. Hench, MD Papers.

This collection contains Dr. Hench's personal and professional documents from his childhood, 1896, to his death, 1965. These papers provide information about his family and life, including his service in World War II, his contributions to medical research in rheumatic diseases, his Nobel Award and other awards. Dr. Hench, a co-developer of cortisone as a anti-inflammatory treatment for rheumatoid arthritis, was a joint winner of the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1950.