Albert Narath

Albert Narath was an Austrian surgeon and anatomist, born in Vienna on 13 September 1864 and dying in Heidelberg on 15 August 1924. He studied medicine in Vienna, graduating in 1890, and worked as an assistant in anatomy under Emil Zuckerkandl until 1891 before training in surgery. In 1893 he became an assistant at the university clinic under Theodor Billroth and Carl Gussenbauer. From 1896 to 1906 he was professor of surgery at Utrecht, succeeding Anton Eiselsberg, and in 1906 he followed Vincenz Czerny as chair of surgery at the Heidelberg university clinic. He resigned the chair in 1910 for health reasons but kept editing the Deutsche Zeitschrift für Chirurgie and writing for scientific publications. His research covered the structure of the bronchial system and hernias, and his name is attached to Narath's femoral hernia, a prevascular hernia lying behind the femoral vessels because of displacement of the psoas muscle in patients with congenital hip dislocation. He also wrote papers on varicocele surgery, pneumatocele of the parotid, retroperitoneal lymph cysts and omentum plasty.