Background
Sara Murray was born in Newton, Massachusetts, in 1884. Her father, Patrick Andrew Murray, was an Irish carriage-repair worker, while her mother, Maria Stuart, was of English and Scottish heritage.
Sara Murray was born in Newton, Massachusetts, in 1884. Her father, Patrick Andrew Murray, was an Irish carriage-repair worker, while her mother, Maria Stuart, was of English and Scottish heritage.
Bachelor of Arts, Radcliffe College, 1904. Doctor of Philosophy, University Munich, Germany, 1908. Doctor of Medicine Tufts Medical School, 1921.
Honorary Doctor of Science, Smith College, 1935.
Tufts College 1943, Wilson College, 1946. Doctor of Humanities, Suffolk University, 1954.
Doctor of Medical Science (honorary), Woman’s Medical College Pennsylvania, 1956.
She practiced largely in Boston and specialized in peptic ulcer disease and gastric cancer. Sara Murray enrolled at Radcliffe College in 1901 and received a bachelor"s degree in the classics in 1904. Their daughter, Mary Stuart Jordan, was born in 1914, and Murray returned to the United States upon the outbreak of the First World War.
In 1917, Jordan decided to enroll in medical school.
She was accepted into the Tufts University School of Medicine on probation under the agreement that she would study chemistry and zoology courses in addition to medicine. When her probation was not lifted despite her having completed the required extra courses, she called for an investigation by the American Medical Association (American Medical Association) and her probation was lifted.
As a student, she performed research on thyroid disease with Frank Lahey, and they co-authored a scientific paper before Jordan graduated in 1921. Jordan completed her internship at Worcester Memorial Hospital before moving to Chicago to train in gastroenterology with Bertram Welton Sippy at Rush Medical College.
After finishing her training, she opened a private practice in Brookline, Massachusetts.
In 1923, she joined Lahey at his nascent Boston-based Lahey Clinic, where she was the head gastroenterologist. She was appointed to the editorial board of the Journal of Digestive Diseases and Nutrition in 1934, which was at the time the official publication of the American Gastroenterological Association (AGA). She was elected president of the AGA in 1942, becoming the first woman to fill the position, and continued for a second term in 1943.
She was involved in the American Medical Association Section of Gastroenterology from 1941 to 1948 and was elected to the Boston Chamber of Commerce in 1948.
Jordan specialized in treating peptic ulcer disease and gastric cancer. She promoted medical rather than surgical interventions, and often recommended conservative therapy based on "diet, recreation, and rest" to her patients.
The result, Good Food for Bad Stomachs, was published in 1951. After retiring from medical practice in 1958, Jordan wrote a newspaper column titled "Health and Happiness".
She diagnosed herself with colon cancer, the disease that led to her death on November 21, 1959 at age 75.
Fellow American College Physicians. Member American Gastro-Enterol. Association (president 1942-1944.
Club: Cosmopolitan (New York City).
Chairman editorial board Gastroenterology, 1956-1958.
Married Sebastian Jordan, January 14, 1913.