Dr frances kelsey biography

In , during her first month at the Food and Drug Administration, Dr. Frances Oldham Kelsey took a bold stance against inadequate testing and corporate pressure when she refused to approve release of thalidomide in the United States.

Frances oldham kelsey movie

The drug had been used as a sleeping pill and was later proven to have caused thousands of birth deformities in Germany and Great Britain. Born Frances Oldham in , on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, she earned both her bachelor of science and master of science degrees from McGill University, Montreal, in and In she earned her Ph.

Frances Oldham married Dr. Fremont Ellis Kelsey, a fellow faculty member at University of Chicago, in Their two daughters were born while she earned her medical degree at the University of Chicago Medical School. Kelsey then worked as an editorial associate at the American Medical Association before teaching pharmacology at University of South Dakota from to She was a general practitioner there from to In she moved to Washington, D.

Frances Kelsey took her stand against thalidomide during her first month at the Food and Drug Administration, on her first assignment.