{{short description|First female Russian ophthalmologist}} '''Maria Alexsandrovna Sechenova''' (Russian: Mария Aлександровна Cеченова; 1839–1929) was the first female ophthalmologist surgeon from the Russian Empire.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|url=https://xn--90aw5c.xn--c1avg/index.php/%D0%A1%D0%95%D0%A7%D0%95%D0%9D%D0%9E%D0%92%D0%90-%D0%91%D0%9E%D0%9A%D0%9E%D0%92%D0%90_%D0%9C%D0%B0%D1%80%D0%B8%D1%8F_%D0%90%D0%BB%D0%B5%D0%BA%D1%81%D0%B0%D0%BD%D0%B4%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%BD%D0%B0|title=СЕЧЕНОВА-БОКОВА Мария Александровна — Большая Медицинская Энциклопедия|website=xn--90aw5c.xn--c1avg|access-date=2019-10-24}}</ref> She was one of the first women to receive an education from a foreign university and one of the first female doctors in Russia.

== Early life == Maria Alexsandrovna Sechenova was the daughter of Alexander Afnasevich Obruchev, a landowner of Tver Oblast and a famous army general in Russia.<ref name=":4" /><ref name=":2" /> She was a sister of Vladimir Alexandrovich Obruchev. To become independent and to attend university, she organized a dummy marriage in August 1861 to her parents' home teacher, medical student, P. I. Bokov, who later became a popular doctor in Moscow.<ref name=":2">{{Cite web|url=https://ru.wikisource.org/wiki/%D0%AD%D0%A1%D0%93/%D0%A1%D0%B5%D1%87%D0%B5%D0%BD%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%B0,_%D0%9C%D0%B0%D1%80%D0%B8%D1%8F_%D0%90%D0%BB%D0%B5%D0%BA%D1%81%D0%B0%D0%BD%D0%B4%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%BD%D0%B0|title=ЭСГ/Сеченова, Мария Александровна — Викитека|website=ru.wikisource.org|access-date=2019-10-24}}</ref><ref name=":0" /><ref name=":4">{{cite web |title=SECHENOVA-BOKOVA Maria Aleksandrovna |url=http://bigmed.info/index.php/SECHENOVA-BOKOVA_Maria_Aleksandrovna |website=Big Medical Encyclopedia |accessdate=5 November 2019}}</ref> In the mid-1860s, she fell in love and entered a real marriage with I. M. Sechenov.

She was one of the first women to attend lecture in university in 1859. Prior, no woman tried to enter university. After her arranged marriage with Bokov, Sechenova and Nadezhda Suslova, the first Russian female to receive a doctoral degree, began studying at St. Petersburg.<ref name=":2" />

At the Medical and Surgical Academy, she studied anatomy under V. L. Gruber and physiology under I. M. Sechenov.<ref name=":0" /> Sechenova was one of the first students to work with I. M. Sechenov in his laboratory at the Medical and Surgical Academy.<ref name=":2" /> Over the summer of 1862, she took Sechenov's supplementary physiology course. After universities began preventing women from attending lectures, Sechenova was forced to leave the academy. In 1868, she moved to Switzerland to study at the University of Zurich and graduated in 1871 with doctoral dissertation "On the doctrine of keratitis."<ref name=":0" />

== Career == During the Franco-Prussian war (1870–1871), she worked voluntarily as a nurse of mercy in the French hospital of Verdun.<ref name=":4" /> After she returned to Russia, Sechenova began working in an eye disease clinic in Kiev.<ref name=":4" /> When women were banned from the university, before continuing her study, Sechenova conducted experiments and published them in the ''Medical Bulletin''.<ref name=":3">{{Cite web|url=http://slonimsmc.grodno.by/museum/Histori%20med/woman/Obruceva.htm|title=Без названия 1|website=slonimsmc.grodno.by|access-date=2019-10-24}}</ref> Before leaving Europe and returning to Russia, she published the study, “A way to produce artificial color blindness”, under Sechenov's guidance.<ref name=":0" /> Upon her return to Russia, she practiced medicine at home. Later, due to the lack of opportunities to work as an eye surgeon, Sechenova became more engaged with literary and natural sciences. She is the translator of Bram's ''Animal Life''.<ref name=":2" /><ref name=":0" />

== Popular culture == N. G. Chernyshevsky wrote ''What is to be done?,'' a famous novel that features Vera Pavlovna, a character based on Sechenova.<ref name=":2" /><ref>{{Cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/uneasycareersint00sbio|url-access=registration|page=[https://archive.org/details/uneasycareersint00sbio/page/177 177]|quote=maria bokova-sechenova.|title=Uneasy Careers and Intimate Lives: Women in Science, 1789-1979|last=Abir-Am|first=Pnina G.|author-link=Pnina Abir-Am|last2=Outram|first2=Dorinda|date=1987|publisher=Rutgers University Press|isbn=9780813512563|language=en}}</ref> At the beginning of his novel, Chernyshevsky notes, “... all the essential in my story are facts experiences by my good friends.” (Kirsanov - Sechenov, Vera Pavlovna - Maria Alexandrovna, Lopukhov - Bokov).<ref name=":3" />

== References == {{Reflist}}

{{authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sechenova, Maria}} Category:1839 births Category:1929 deaths Category:Ophthalmologists from the Russian Empire Category:Surgeons from the Russian Empire Category:Russian women surgeons Category:Women surgeons Category:Women medical doctors from the Russian Empire Category:19th-century medical doctors from the Russian Empire Category:University of Zurich alumni Category:19th-century surgeons