Gabrielle Lévy

Gabrielle Charlotte Lévy (11 January 1886 – 6 October 1934) was a French neurologist, for whose work the Roussy–Lévy syndrome and the Lhermitte-Lévy syndrome are named. She also made significant contributions to the understanding of encephalitis lethargica.

Early life and education Lévy was born in Paris on 11 January 1886 to Mina Marie Lang (1851–1903) and Emile Gustave Lévy (1844–1912), who was in the textile business. She was the last of five children, and the only girl. An obituary published in the Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease describes her as having "qualities of intense application and of intelligence." She became a full attending physician shortly before her death. It was reviewed by Eduard Feindel, who described it as rich in facts and original ideas. It is a disease of the peripheral nervous system, caused by a mutation in one of two myelin genes. The Lhermitte-Lévy syndrome, a progressive post-stroke paralysis, was named for their work.

Other interests During the First World War, the Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital became a military neurological centre. Lévy became interested in the neurology of war, and wrote several articles on war injuries she observed in the hospital.

Throughout her career, Lévy published several articles on movement disorders, describing cases of rhythmic myoclonus of the palate muscles (also known as palatal nystagmus or palatal myoclonus), athetosis, and choreic movement disorders. According to Gustave Roussy, Lévy's work on palatal myoclonus was particularly influential.

In addition, Roussy was mainly an oncologist, so under his direction, Lévy wrote several reviews on neuro-oncology. She collaborated with both Roussy and Simone Laborde on the use of radiotherapy for cerebral tumours.

Personal life Lévy had to choose between marriage and career, reportedly declining a proposal from an ophthalmologist because she did not want to abandon her work. In the obituary written by Gustave Roussy, he explains that "circumstances made her work, research and the exercise of her profession her raison d'être". He further praises the numerous qualities she possessed: "In all her work, we find the mark of her personality: the method in the rigorous observation of the facts, the determination to pursue the analysis and the repeated verification of a sign or a lesion that may have seemed unusual or new to her, the curiosity to go back to the origins of this sign in order to find its logical and rational explanation, the patience to frequently compare what she saw with what others had noted before her, finally the taste to debate - as she liked to call them - with her contradictors, the validity of her assertions, and in this dialectic in which she excelled, she was served by a great memory and a perfect knowledge of foreign languages."

Lévy died on 6 October 1934, at the age of 48, in the middle of reviewing a new article on Roussy–Lévy syndrome. She suffered from a severe disease of the nervous system, which she diagnosed herself, but she remained lucid until the end. Though her family believed that her death was caused by the very disease she was studying, the real cause of her death is uncertain.