Olga Stastny, MD, born in Wilber, Nebraska, in 1878, overcame personal and professional challenges to build a distinguished medical career.
Following the death of her husband, Dr. Charles Stastny, Stastny, a 28-year-old newly single mother of two, pursued her ambition to study medicine. In 1908, she enrolled at the University of Nebraska College of Medicine. The college admitted women “on an equal basis as men.”
Managing motherhood and medical school, she graduated in 1913.
When World War I broke out in 1914, Dr. Stastny sold liberty bonds and promoted the goals of the National Council for Defense. She also joined the American Women’s Hospitals, a relief agency founded by the American Women’s Medical Association. The association, established in 1893, addressed the underrepresentation of women in medicine and promoted equal opportunities for female physicians.
Female physicians faced challenges in contributing to the war effort. Attempts made by the American Women’s Medical Association to lobby for inclusion in the Army Medical Reserve Corps were ultimately unsuccessful. However, other organizations supported women physicians on the frontlines. Dr. Stastny deployed with American Women’s Hospitals’ Unit #1 to Luzancy, France, in 1918. She served as an anesthetist for one year during the post-war reconstruction period until the unit disbanded.
Following the war, Dr. Stastny’s international service continued. In 1920, at the invitation of Alice Masarykova, PhD, daughter of the Czechoslovakian president, Dr. Stastny relocated to Prague. There, she served as chief of hygiene at the School of Social Service, dedicated to improving public health. She also surveyed the city’s nursing situation, with her findings leading to the establishment of an American Red Cross nurse’s training station in 1920.
In 1922, she relocated to Greece to serve as the medical director of the AWH units on Macronissi Island. Dr. Stastny led care coordination for thousands of quarantined Greek and Armenian people who were displaced by a destructive fire that burned the port city of Smyrna following the end of the Greco-Turkish War. She ensured quarantine protocols were met to prevent the spread of disease. Her work earned her the Cross of St. George from the Greek government.
Returning to the United States in 1924, Dr. Stastny opened a medical practice in Omaha. She joined the University of Nebraska College of Medicine faculty in 1925 and became an instructor in obstetrics and gynecology by 1931. Her professional activities included attending the 1929 International Medical Women’s Conference in London and serving as president of the Women’s National Medical Association in 1929.
Dr. Stastny retired from the University of Nebraska College of Medicine in 1943, leaving a remarkable legacy of service to advance public health. She died in Omaha in 1952 at 74.