In 1905, Getzowa was hired by Professor Hans Strasser as first female assistant at the Bern Institute of Anatomy. She began analysis of
goiters and
parathyroid tissues and along with Langhans and other of his students was one of the key researchers who clarified the origin of
thyroid tumors. She continued with her studies, this time at the Institute of Pathology, under the direction of
Theodor Langhans and Ernst Hedinger,. Thanks to her pleasant demeanor, she was popular with her fellow students and colleagues. In 1907,
Carl Wegelin was so impressed by her removal of a tumor by abdominal incision that he developed a close professional relationship with her. Wegelin later became the first president of the Swiss Academy of Medicine. That same year, she discovered
solid cell nests (SCN), becoming the first to describe them. As Langhans was nearing retirement, he prepared for his departure and both Wegelin and Getzowa were encouraged to apply for the post. Wegelin had
habilitated in 1908 and Langhans used Getzowa's research to grant her Habilitation in 1912. Though seven years younger than Getzowa, Wegelin succeeded Langhans as director of the Anatomical institute. and she was appointed as a
Privatdozent at the University of Bern. In 1913, Getzowa was appointed first assistant at the Institute and with the beginning of
World War I in 1914, she stood in for the director who had been called to military duty. After two years of service, as a woman and a foreigner she was dismissed in October 1915. Without any income, her previous professor Ernst Hedinger offered her a post at the
University of Basel in 1916. The position ended after nine months and she became the
prosector at the
Kantonsspital St. Gallen on a recommendation from Wegelin. Over the next two years, she worked in the pathology clinic where she performed abdominal operations. When the war ended, Getzowa was cut off from friends and family in her former homeland. The
Polish–Soviet War (1919–1921) devastated what was left of her home and annexed the land as part of the
Second Polish Republic. She returned to Bern, and experienced both emotional and financial difficulties, which did not dissipate until 1921 when the American Putman-Jacoby Foundation arranged for her to work as a freelance researcher at the
Pasteur Institute in Paris. Given an opportunity to come back to Bern, she returned to work at the Institute in 1924. The following year was awarded special retroactive remuneration for teaching experimental pathology at the university. At the time she left Paris, Getzowa learned of another opening, that of working for the
Hadassah Women's Zionist Organization of America in a pathology institute in
Eretz Yisrael, but she was unsure of its financial reliability as there was a dispute between the Swiss officials who were providing the chairs for the medical facility and the Palestinian bankers. She sought advice from
Albert Einstein and he wrote to the authorities in
Jerusalem recommending her and suggesting they offer reasonable, well-defined conditions. Getzowa, reluctantly, also asked Chaim Weizmann for support, as it was he who was involved in founding a Jewish university in Jerusalem. Weizmann replied half a year later, supporting her desire to receive a post of pathologist but explaining administrative structures first needed to be established. Finally matters were sorted out and Getzowa was engaged as a pathological specialist. She set sail on a steamer in the autumn of 1925, having been appointed director of an as yet non-existent pathological institute to be located at the
Rothschild Hadassah Hospital. In 1927, Getzowa became the first female professor of Israel, when she was appointed as a lecturer of the
Hebrew University of Jerusalem. She began working at hospitals in
Tel Aviv, undertaking abdominal examinations which in some cases identified tumors in need of removal. The operations upset orthodox Jews who smashed her laboratory windows. In 1931, Getzowa returned to Basel, seeking international support to complete the pathological institute, visiting her European friends, and keeping up with pathological practice. In 1933, the death in Paris of her friend, colleague and financial supporter, Leo Motzkin, caused Getzowa to fall into a deep depression. In 1939, Getzowa returned to Jerusalem, where her pathology center had been completed as an addition to the Hadassah Hospital on
Mount Scopus. The administration of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem refused to recognize her as a professor, taking no account of her background in Bern or the 13 years she had already spent working for Palestine. She was offered the chance to obtain a habilitation in Jerusalem but she refused, maintaining it would take years off her career. On 1 February 1939, the university asked for her resignation. Calling on support from international colleagues, Getzowa obtained references for the rector of the university,
Abraham Fraenkel, and requests asking him to reconsider her application. Three months later, on 19 February 1940, Fraenkel granted her status as a
professor emeritus of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. ==Contribution to research==