[Suicide of dermatologists in relation to political change].

Anti-semitism increased from year to year in Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945. The fear of annihilation resulted in a surge of suicides. The suicides of at least 9 Jewish dermatologists has been documented. Their mean age was 65 years. Couples often committed suicide together. At the end of World War II, the head of the dermatological department of the Prague University committed suicide. We assume the same happened in Rostock and Dresden. The president of the German Dermatological Society (DDG) committed suicide on March 27, 1945. The motives of these dermatologists were obviously the collapse of Nazism and the fear of relatiatory measures.