Harry Gold, MD Papers

Harry Gold was born in Russia on December 25, 1899 and immigrated to the United States as an infant. While studying at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa, and, in 1919, graduated with a bachelor of arts. Three years later in 1922, Dr. Gold earned his medical degree from Cornell University Medical College (now Weill Cornell Medical College).

Immediately following graduation, Cornell University Medical College hired Dr. Gold as an instructor in pharmacology, a position he retained until his promotion in 1929 to assistant professor. In 1944 he became associate professor of pharmacology and, three years later, earned the title of full professor. Dr. Gold served in this capacity until his retirement in 1965, whereby he received the distinction of professor emeritus. From 1930 through 1935, Dr. Gold taught graduate courses in medicine at Rutgers University and from 1945 through the early 1950s lectured at Seton Hall University on topics which included therapeutics, cardiology, electrocardiology, and cardiac fluoroscopy.

In addition to an academic career that spanned over forty years, Dr. Gold also served as a physician and medical consultant for several hospitals in New York and elsewhere. From 1922 to 1931 he worked as an assistant physician at Bellevue Hospital and from 1931 through the mid-1960s as an attending physician at Beth Israel Hospital and the Hospital for Joint Diseases where he conducted much of his research in their cardiac clinics. Dr. Gold served as the attending-in-charge of the Cardiovascular Research Unit at Beth Israel and the chairman of the Medical Advisory Board at the Hospital for Joint Diseases. In the mid-1960s he transitioned from staff physician to consultant at both hospitals. From 1942 through 1967, Dr. Gold also served as a physician to out-patients at New York Hospital. Dr. Gold tendered his services at a number of other institutions, including Saint Vincent’s, Sea View, Richmond Memorial and Doctors Hospitals, as well as Saint Francis Sanatorium for Rheumatic Children, the New York Cardiac Center, and a number of others.

As a pharmacologist and cardiologist, Dr. Gold helped pioneer the standardization of digitalis compounds for the treatment of heart disease. His work focused on diuretics and anti-hypertensive medication and relied heavily on the use of placebos when evaluating the efficacy of various drugs. Dr. Gold was among the first to promote the double-blind test wherein neither the researcher nor the patient knows which medication (or placebo) each individual in the study is receiving. Only after the study concludes is the information revealed.

Along with his faculty and staff appointments, Dr. Gold was a fellow of the New York Academy of Medicine, the American Medical Association, the New York Academy of Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He also served as a director of the New York Heart Association and a member of numerous professional organizations including, among others, the American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics, the Revision Committee for the U.S. Pharmacopoeia, and the American Heart Association.

He was married to Bertha Gold, Emeritus Professor of Physiology at Hunter College. They raised three children, Stanley, Muriel, and Naomi. Gold died of a stroke on April 21, 1972 at the age of 72 at his home in New York City.

Bibliography “Bulletin and Calendar of Events, May 31, 1971.” The New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center 12, no. 37. “Harry Gold, a Heart Specialist and Digitalis Pioneer, is Dead.” New York Times, April 22, 1972.