Immigrant of the Day: Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, M.D. (July 8, 1926–August 24, 2004) was a Swiss-born psychiatrist and the author of the groundbreaking book On Death and Dyingl.

Kübler-Ross was born in Zürich, Switzerland, one of a set of identical triplets. She graduated from the University of Zürich medical school in 1957. She moved to the United States in 1958 to work and continue her studies in New York. As she began her practice, she was appalled by the hospital treatment of patients who were dying. She began giving a series of lectures featuring terminally ill patients, forcing medical students to confront people who were dying. Her extensive work with the dying led to On Death and Dying in 1969. She wrote over 20 additional books on the subject of dying. She also proposed the now famous Five Stages of Grief as a pattern of phases, most or all of which people tend to go through, in sequence, after being faced with the tragedy of their own impending death. The five stages of grief, in sequential order, are denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. The five stages have since been adopted by many as applying to the survivors of a loved one’s death, as well.

Kübler-Ross completed her degree in psychiatry at the University of Colorado in 1963 and received 23 honorary doctorates. She suffered a series of strokes in 1995 that left her partially paralyzed. She died in 2004 at her home in Scottsdale, Arizona.

For a collection of websites with information about Kübler-Ross and her work, click here.

KJ