Jerusha Jhirad

Jerusha Jacob Jhirad FRCOG, MBE (21 March 1891 – 2 June 1984) was an Indian physician.

Early life and education Jhirad was born in Shivamogga, Karnataka. She was a member of the Bene Israel Jewish community. She attended high school in Pune, She was the first woman to be granted a scholarship by the Indian government to study abroad. and went on to a doctorate (M.D.) in 1919 in Midwifery and Diseases of Women. Specializing in obstetrics and gynaecology

Career While she was studying in England during World War I, Jhirad was an obstetric assistant and house surgeon at the Elizabeth Garrett Anderson Hospital in London, and house surgeon at a maternity hospital in Birmingham. Back in India by 1920, she was briefly an obstetrician at the Lady Hardinge Hospital in Delhi. From 1920 to 1924, she was medical officer-in-charge at the maternity hospital in Bangalore. From 1925 to 1928 she was on the staff of the Cama Hospital in Mumbai, where she served as medical officer-in-charge in 1929 to 1947. She was a founding member and president of the Bombay Obstetric and Gynaecological Society,

Selected publications

"Medico-social work" (1929) "Maternal Mortality" (1936) "Report on an investigation into the causes of maternal mortality in the city of Bombay." (1941) "Women in the Medical Profession" (1960) "Practical aspects of birth control" (1963) "Role of legalization of abortions in population control" (1964) "Careers for Medical Women in India" (1964) "Ante-natal diagnosis" (1966) "Obstetrics Then and Now" (1968)

Honours

In 1945, Jhirad was awarded an MBE by the British government. In 1947, she was elected a Fellow of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists.

Personal life Jhirad wrote a short autobiography in 1975, which informed her niece's biography of her, A Dream Realised: Biography of Dr Jerusha J. Jhirad (1990). She died in 1984, aged 93 years.