Ernst Siemerling was a German neurologist

Neurologist

A neurologist is a physician who specializes in neurology, and is trained to investigate, or diagnose and treat neurological disorders.Neurology is the medical specialty related to the human nervous system. The nervous system encompasses the brain, spinal cord, and peripheral nerves. A specialist...

 and psychiatrist

Psychiatrist

A psychiatrist is a physician who specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders. All psychiatrists are trained in diagnostic evaluation and in psychotherapy...

 born in Müssow near Greifswald

Greifswald

Greifswald , officially, the University and Hanseatic City of Greifswald is a town in northeastern Germany. It is situated in the state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, at an equal distance of about from Germany's two largest cities, Berlin and Hamburg. The town borders the Baltic Sea, and is crossed...

.

In 1882 he obtained his medical doctorate from the University of Marburg. In 1883-84 he was an assistant at the psychiatric clinic at Halle, and afterwards an assistant to Karl Friedrich Otto Westphal (1833-1890) at the Berlin

Berlin

Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

 psychiatric clinic.

In 1888 he became habilitated for neurology and psychiatry, and in 1893 was appointed professor and director of the psychiatric clinic at the University of Tübingen. In 1900 he accepted the same position at the University of Kiel

University of Kiel

The University of Kiel is a university in the city of Kiel, Germany. It was founded in 1665 as the Academia Holsatorum Chiloniensis by Christian Albert, Duke of Holstein-Gottorp and has approximately 23,000 students today...

, where he remained until his retirement in 1926.

In 1923 with Hans Gerhard Creutzfeldt

Hans Gerhard Creutzfeldt

Hans Gerhard Creutzfeldt was a German neuropathologist, who first described the Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. He was born in Harburg upon Elbe and died in Munich.-Biography:...

 (1885-1964), he described adrenoleukodystrophy

Adrenoleukodystrophy

Adrenoleukodystrophy is a rare, inherited disorder that leads to progressive brain damage, failure of the adrenal glands and eventually death. ALD is a disease in a group of genetic disorders called leukodystrophies, whose chief feature is damage to myelin...

 (ALD), a rare disorder that is sometimes referred to as "Siemerling-Creutzfeldt Disease". With Oswald Bumke (1877-1950), he was editor of the Archiv für Psychiatrie und Nervenkrankheiten, and with Otto Binswanger

Otto Binswanger

Otto Ludwig Binswanger was a Swiss psychiatrist and neurologist who came from a famous family of physicians; his father was founder of the Kreuzlingen Sanatorium, and he was uncle to Ludwig Binswanger who was a major figure in the existential psychology movement...

(1852-1929), was co-author of Lehrbuch der Psychiatrie, a textbook on psychiatry that was published in several editions.