Pinkus, felix

(¤ 1868, 1947) Dermatologist, active in Berlin, Monroe (USA).

Trained at the Breslau dermatological clinic. Established as a dermatologist in Berlin in 1900. 1897 Felix Pinkus described rudimentary sebaceous glands as "coat of the hair follicle". 1902 description of the hair disc, 1902 description of the earliest histopathological changes of lichen planus, 1907 description of lichen nitidus. 1910 Published a textbook of skin and venereal diseases. 1916 Habilitation with a thesis on "the effect of diseases on the hair of the head of man".

In contrast to his son Hermann Pinkus, Felix Pinkus remained in Germany in 1939 and suffered the escalation of oppression by the National Socialists. In 1933, he was removed as secretary of the German Society for the Control of Venereal Diseases. In 1934 he was dropped from the teaching staff of Berlin University. He had to give up his apartment and practice. In 1938, the license of all Jewish physicians was revoked. Only 709 were given permission to continue practicing medicine, but only for Jewish patients and not as physicians, but as "sick care providers." At the beginning of the World War, Felix Pinkus managed to escape via Oslo, Copenhagen and Vladivostok to San Francisco, where he arrived in January 1941. He joined his son Hermann in Michigan and worked in his dermatopathology practice. Pinkus became an honorary member of the Detroit Dermatological Society and the Society for Investigative Dermatology. He died on November 29, 1947 in Monroe, USA.

1. Pinkus F (1917) The effect of diseases on human scalp hair. S. Karger, Berlin