Istvan Nyirjesy, 81, an obstetrician and gynecologist who had a private practice in Bethesda for decades and delivered more than 35,000 babies during his career, died Sept. 28 at Grand Oaks assisted living center in Washington. He had urosepsis, said his daughter, Christine Nyirjesy Bragale.
Dr. Nyirjesy left his native Hungary in 1947 because of the Soviet occupation, received his medical degree in Belgium and immigrated to the United States in 1954. He spent 10 years in the Navy Medical Corps before leaving in 1968 at the rank of commander.
He had a private practice in Bethesda from 1968 to 2007. In addition, he was a clinical professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Georgetown University medical school from 1968 to 2010.
He was an attending obstetrician and gynecologist at Sibley Memorial Hospital in Washington and Georgetown’s medical center.
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He held consulting duties with the National Institutes of Health and the Food and Drug Administration and was a diplomate of the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology.
Istvan Nyirjesy was born in Budapest. During the Soviet occupation, he fled to Austria before arriving in Belgium, where he received a medical degree from the Catholic University of Louvain.
Share this articleShareOnce in the United States, he settled initially in the Chicago area. He completed his medical internship at the Little Company of Mary Hospital in the Chicago suburb of Evergreen Park.
Dr. Nyirjesy, who became a U.S. citizen in 1958, maintained deep ties to his homeland.
He was a founder of the Hungarian Club of Washington and chaired a committee to build a statue of Michael Kovats de Fabricy, a Hungarian-born military commander who was killed while fighting for the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War. The statue was erected in 2003 on the grounds of the Hungarian Embassy in Washington.
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Dr. Nyirjesy was founder and president of a now-defunct foundation that funded and coordinated training for Hungarian physicians in screening and detection of cervical cancer.
In retirement, he did volunteer work at the Mercy Health Clinic in Gaithersburg. He and his wife were among the founders of a French-speaking Catholic parish of Washington known as La Paroisse St. Louis de France.
Dr. Nyirjesy’s wife of 54 years, Michelle Schoepp Nyirjesy, died in January. Their son Francis Nyirjesy died in 2004.
Survivors include two children, Paul Nyirjesy of Rydal, Pa., and Christine Nyirjesy Bragale of Bethesda; a sister, Margit Bory of Chevy Chase; and six grandchildren.
— Adam Bernstein
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