Dr. Jane C. Wright

Achievements

• Pioneer chemotherapy researcher,
• Introducing the use of methotrexate in the treatment of skin and breast cancer.

Dr. Jane C. Wright makes the first entry on our list of famous female doctors. She descended from a renowned medical family that defied the social and racial barriers in a profession that was traditionally dominated by white men.

For instance, Dr. Wright’s father was Dr. Louis T. Wright, one of the first black graduates of Harvard Medical School, and the first black doctor appointed to the staff of a New York City hospital. Her grandfather graduated from the Meharry Medical College, the first medical school in the South for African-Americans.

Coming from such a groundbreaking medical family, it’s no wonder Dr. Wright is now one of the most famous black women in medicine, pioneering several medical fields. One of the biggest breakthroughs in cancer treatment was the development of chemotherapy in the 1940’s.

More specifically, she is credited with inventing a groundbreaking technique that involved using human tissue culture rather than laboratory mice to test the effects of potential drugs on cancer cells.

Thus, she played a major role in elevating chemotherapy from a last resort treatment for cancer to the treatment that has the best shot of containing the disease. Another notable achievement is pioneering the use of methotrexate to treat skin cancer and breast cancer.