Gustavus M. Blech

Gustavus Maximilian Blech (November 28, 1870 in Riga (then Russia) – August 9, 1949 in Chicago, Illinois) was an American physician, surgeon, and medical educator.

After immigrating to the United States in 1890, he earned his MD degree from Barnes Medical College of St. Louis, Missouri, in 1894.

He served as surgeon-in-chief, Lincoln Hospital, Chicago; professor of clinical surgery, Illinois Medical College, 1907–1912, and medical department, Loyola University Chicago, 1912–1914; consulting surgeon at Cook County Hospital and Wesley Memorial Hospital, Chicago; director-in-chief of the Illinois Legion, American Red Cross; and major, Illinois Infantry Medical Corps.

Blech was a veteran of the United States Army, achieving the rank of colonel, and the Illinois National Guard, achieving the rank of brigadier general, and served in the Spanish–American War, the Mexican border skirmishes, and World War I; in that latter war, he served as a colonel, Medical Reserve Corps, United States Army, and as an officier de l'instruction publique for France.

Blech wrote chapters in the books The Therapeutical Applications of Peroxide of Hydrogen, Glycozone,[1] Hydrozone,[2] and Eye Balsam, Diseases of Children, and The Military Surgeon.