Working long hours and with limited infrastructure, she trained and supervised all personnel at the hospital from 1916 to the 1930s, and founded the Shaare Zedek School of Nursing in 1934.

[1] Selma later wrote, "Because I lost my mother very early and therefore had a rather difficult youth, a strong need grew in me to give people that which I had missed so much: mother-love and love of human beings.

He was impressed with the similar organizational structure of the Salomon Heine Hospital in Hamburg, and asked the head nurse there if she could spare one of her staff.

[3][7] Embarking on a four-week train journey through Central Europe, Turkey, and Damascus,[1] Schwester Selma arrived at Shaare Zedek in December 1916.

The hospital recruited untrained workers, whom Schwester Selma outfitted in "overalls and hoods" to protect them from infection; she ordered all incoming patients washed and shaved over their entire bodies.

[8] While attempting to provide a high level of patient care for Jews, Christians, and Arabs, Shaare Zedek operated without electricity, indoor plumbing, central heating, or gas cooking stoves.

[2] For many years, Schwester Selma was Dr. Wallach's right-hand assistant in the areas of uterine curettages, tracheotomies, and ritual circumcisions,[3] accompanied him on house calls, and stood in for him as hospital director when he was away.

[3] In the wards, she cultivated a spirit of warm, personalized patient care that continues to be the modus operandi for the hospital to this day.

While she seriously considered the offer, the Frankfurt-based board of directors of Shaare Zedek convinced her not to leave, with a promise "to support her for the rest of her life".

[1] The November 1947 United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine was announced during her annual two-week holiday, which she spent with friends in Naharia.

Schwester Selma displayed unceasing devotion to the running of the iron lung machines, teaching and supervising the untrained personnel who were recruited to work in the ward.

The idea was initially opposed by Dr. Wallach, who worried that the school would emphasize theory over practical nursing, but Schwester Selma's curriculum proved him wrong.

[3] A Time cover story on 29 December 1975, named her as one of the world's "living saints" in a list that included Mother Teresa, Sister Annie, Dom Hélder Câmara, and Father Matta El Meskeen.

[1][20][21] Schwester Selma once received a diamond ring from a Holocaust survivor whose sister had given her the valuable item before she was deported, saying, "If I do not return, give it to a human being who has never married and has devoted her life to helping other people".