Awards & Winners

Jan G. Waldenström

Jan Gösta Waldenström was a Swedish doctor of internal medicine, who first described the disease which bears his name, Waldenström's macroglobulinemia. He was born in Stockholm, and arose from a medical family: his father, Johann Henning Waldenström was a professor of orthopedic surgery in Stockholm, and his grandfather, Johan Anton Waldenström was professor of internal medicine in Uppsala. Waldenström obtained his M.D. degree at the University of Uppsala, and studied organic chemistry with Hans Fischer at the Technical University of Munich. He was professor of theoretical medicine at the University of Uppsala in 1941, and became professor of practical medicine at the University of Lund in 1944. He was the head of the Department of Medicine at Malmö General Hospital until his retirement in 1972. Waldenström first described, in 1944, patients suffering from a disease that has subsequently been named for him, Waldenstrom's macroglobulinema, a "hyperviscosity syndrome" in which symptoms are caused by abnormal lymphocytes which prevent normal bone marrow function, causing anemia and hepatosplenomegaly, and which secrete large immunoglobulins, causing bleeding difficulties.

Awards by Jan G. Waldenström

Check all the awards nominated and won by Jan G. Waldenström.

1966


Gairdner Foundation International Award
(In recognition of his contributions to our knowledge of certain metabolic disorders and in particular for his clarification of the serum protein abnormalities in multiple myeloma and in essential macroglobulinaemia.These observations have contributed materially to a better understanding of the function of certain high molecular weight antibodies, the structure of gamma globulins, and the cell types which gave rise to them.)