Illig was born in 1924 in
Nuremberg, Germany, and moved to Switzerland as an adolescent during the
Second World War. After studying medicine, she undertook a residency in
pediatrics under
Guido Fanconi at the
University Children's Hospital in
Zürich. She worked there 1956 to 1987, during which time she established the hospital's endocrinology laboratory. She developed techniques for measuring
growth hormone and
insulin levels, and her
thyroid stimulating hormone (TSH) assay was used in the first Swiss national screening program for
congenital hypothyroidism, beginning in 1977. Illig became a full professor of the
University of Zurich in 1977. She was a founding member of the
European Society for Pediatric Endocrinology and she received the society's Outstanding Clinician Award in 2006. She died on 26 June 2017. ==References==