Friedrich Ernst Krukenberg

Friedrich Ernst Krukenberg was the youngest of seven children. His father was a lawyer, but his family had great traditions in medicine. Following his initial studies in his native city, Krukenberg continued his medical studies in Marburg under the German ophthalmologist Karl Theodor Paul Polykarpus Axenfeld (1867-1930).

For a period Krukenberg worked in Marburg under Felix Jacob Marchand (1846-1928), his teacher, who was pathology department chief. Marchand in 1879 had described a peculiar form of ovarial cancer, and Krukenberg was given six cases of ovarial tumours by his tutor. From these cases he prepared his thesis of doctorat in his final year of medical studies. Neither of these cases was metastatic as no other primary was depicted on section.

Krukenberg specialised in Ophthalmology and was a fellow of Axenfeld whom he followed to another university.

Krukenberg was only twenty-five years old when he described "fibrosarcoma ovarii mucocellulare carcinomatodes" – and with that his scientific production seems to have ceased completely. However, he later on kept as editor to scientific medicine but then went of to his birth town Halle where he had a privat practice. He died in 1946, at the age of almost 75 years.

The Krukenberg family can boast of two other physicians who have written their names into the history of medicine. His brother Hermann (1863-1935) was a well-known orthopaedic surgeon, remembered for Krukenberg's arm, Krukenberg's chopstick and Krukenberg's method. Another brother, Georg Heinrich Peter Krukenberg (1855-1899), was professor of gynaecology at Bonn. The Krukenberg brothers were grandchildren of Peter Krukenberg (1788-1865), and great-grandchildren of Johann Christian Reil (1759-1813) the neuropathologist, who had an area of the brain named after him, the Islands of Reil.

We thank Dr. med. Andreas See, Frankenberg, for information submitted.