Medicine is the study of life, health, illness, and death of human beings, involving diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of diseases. The passage discusses three pioneering women in medicine: Elizabeth Blackwell, who was the first woman to practice medicine in the United States and found a university of medicine for women; Françoise Barré-Sinoussi, who performed fundamental work identifying HIV and won the Nobel Prize in Medicine in 2008; and an unnamed woman who was the first to practice medicine as a doctor around the world.