Hélène Sosnowska

Hélène Sosnowska (born Helena Goldspiegel; 13 February 1864 – 31 January 1942), also known as Hélène Goldspiegel-Sosnowska, was a Polish-French gynaecologist, medical writer, and social reformer. Born into a Jewish family in Warsaw, she settled in Paris, studied at the University of Paris Faculty of Medicine, and in 1888 defended a thesis on hysteria in children under the supervision of Jean-Martin Charcot, making her one of the earliest women to obtain a medical doctorate there. She established a gynaecological practice in Paris, became known for using and promoting the Thure-Brandt method for chronic gynaecological conditions and infertility, and published on uterine disease, clinical techniques and the effects of vegetarianism and fasting on health. She took part in international medical congresses and during World War I worked in Paris hospitals caring for wounded patients and supporting Polish medical trainees.

Sosnowska was active in movements for temperance and vegetarianism, wrote for specialist and general audiences on nutrition, childcare and women's health, and belonged to organisations including the Society of Breastfeeding and the Society of Kinesitherapy. Within the French Vegetarian Society she served as a committee member from 1904, vice-president from 1907 and president from 1933, and her death brought the society's activities to an end. She married the Polish engineer and socialist activist Casimir Martin Sosnowski, with whom she had two children, and was buried with him at Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.