Fleischner, Felix

Felix George Fleischner, 1893-1969, MD, University of Vienna Medical School, was named the first full-time radiologist at the Beth Israel Hospital in Boston, Mass. with appointments at Harvard Medical School and Tufts University Medical School in 1942. He became Clinical Professor of Radiology at Harvard Medical School in 1950, and Emeritus in 1960.

Felix George Fleischner (1893-1969), M.D., 1919, University of Vienna, Austria, was Clinical Professor of Radiology at Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, and Radiologist-in-Chief, Emeritus, Beth Israel Hospital (now Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital), Boston. Fleischner’s research focused on pulmonary diseases, including atelectasis and bronchiectasis, as well as diseases of the heart and colon.

Felix George Fleischner was born on 29 July 1893 in Vienna, Austria. He graduated from State Gymnasium, Vienna VI, in 1912 and earned an M.D. from the University of Vienna in 1919. After finishing his graduate studies, Fleischner completed internships at the Karolinen Kinderspital and the First University Medical Clinic, and was a resident, and later Assistant in Radiology, at the Wilhelminenspital from 1921 to 1929. Fleischner left Wilhelminenspital to train under Austrian radiologist and inventor Guido Holzknecht (1872-1931) at the Zentral Roentgen Institute (1929-1930), after which he served as a Docent of Radiology at the University of Vienna (1931). In 1932, Fleischner joined the Vienna C.S. Child’s Hospital as Director of Radiology.

Fleischner and his family moved to the United States in 1938, where he served as a Graduate Assistant under George W. Holmes (1876-) in the Department of Radiology at Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston. Following his assistantship, Fleischner opened a radiologic practice in Greenfield, Massachusetts (1940-1942), which he left to become the first full-time radiologist at Beth Israel Hospital (1942-1960), eventually serving as the Hospital’s Radiologist-in-Chief. During this time, Fleischner held several positions at Harvard Medical School, including Instructor in Radiology (1943), Clinical Associate in Radiology (1947), Clinical Assistant Professor of Radiology (1952), and Clinical Professor of Radiology (1955). He also served as Instructor in Radiology (1943) and Assistant Professor (1945) at Tufts College Medical School (now Tufts University School of Medicine). Fleischner remained at Beth Israel Hospital and Harvard Medical School until his retirement in 1960. Post-retirement, he continued to practice medicine, holding several consulting positions, including: Consultant in Radiology at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital, Boston, 1960 to 1966; Consultant Visiting Radiologist at Massachusetts General Hospital, 1966 to 1969; and Consultant in Radiology to the Veterans Affairs Hospital in Boston and West Roxbury, Massachusetts.

During the course of his career, Fleischner wrote over 250 articles on topics such as pulmonary embolism, mitral stenosis, emphysema, atelectasis, bronchiectasis, and diverticulitis. His articles appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine, Radiology, and American Journal of Roentgenology. Fleischner was also a contributor and a co-editor of Cardiology: An Encyclopedia of the Cardiovascular System, a five volume text edited by Aldo A. Luisada and sponsored by the American College of Radiology. Fleischner was a member and former President of the New England Roentgen Ray Society, as well as a member of the American Roentgen Ray Society, the Radiological Society of North America, and the American College of Radiology. In addition to membership in many national medical and scientific professional organizations, Fleischner was elected a Fellow of the Faculty of Radiologists of England in 1968. In honor of his contributions to research in pulmonary embolism and chest radiology, two international symposia were dedicated in his name. In the late 1960s, Fleischner and a small group of radiologists began to organize a thoracic radiology society. When the society was formally created in December 1969, Fleischner’s colleagues named it the Fleischner Society, in memory of the radiologist.

Felix Fleischner died in 1969 of acute cardiac arrest. He was survived by his wife, Risa Sporer, and their two daughters, Suzanne and Elizabeth.