Rudolf Altschul

Altschul, Rudolf

Rudolf Altschul, professor of anatomy, scientist, author (b at Prague [Czech] 24 Feb 1901; d at Saskatoon 4 Nov 1963). He received his medical degree in Prague and did postgraduate work in Paris and in Rome. In 1928 he began the practice of neuropsychiatry in Prague, but in 1939 he and his wife fled the Nazi occupation and made their way to Canada and the University of Saskatchewan, where he was first an instructor and, by 1955, head of the department of anatomy.

Altschul was a man of broad culture: photographer, linguist, connoisseur of the arts, a born raconteur and superb teacher. He was the author of 103 scientific papers dealing with a wide variety of subjects, including the pathology of the nervous system, skeletal muscle degeneration, cell division and, in particular, arterial degeneration. He publishedSelected Studies on Arteriosclerosis (1950), and Endothelium - Its Development, Morphology, Function and Pathology (1954). His later research led to niacin therapy for lowering blood-serum cholesterol and in 1964 to the publication of Niacin in Vascular Disorders and Hyperlipemia.