János Plesch

Who was János Plesch?

János Plesch was a Jewish-Hungarian academic pathologist, physiologist and physician who lived in Berlin for much of his early working life. He was well known internationally for his clinical research on the circulation of the blood, including the invention of the first convenient device for measuring blood pressure.

He also became famous as the doctor and friend of many leading personalities in the scientific, social and artistic worlds of his day. For example, he was a close friend and doctor to Albert Einstein for 25 years. His biography contains two chapters that provide one of the most intimate glimpses of Einstein ever published.

In the 1930s, János Plesch escaped the Nazis, and settled in England for many years, where he was required to study again to re-qualify as a medical doctor.