German Hygiene Museum — Attraction in Dresden

I only had 24 hours in Dresden and it’s unfortunate that I spent 2+ hours getting to and trying to navigate this museum. I work in health care so I figured I’d enjoy the largest health museum in the world more than, say, an art museum or the inside of another church. I was wrong. The experience was ruined by the fact that the permanent exhibit has very little in English. A section of the exhibit would but if you wanted to read about a particular piece in the collection, it’s all in German.

I spent more precious time going back to the reception area where they explained I could download an app. I did but the audio tour would have been way too slow to go through the museum.

I DO understand that this is Germany, but I DO NOT understand how a health care museum doesn’t use English (all European doctors study medicine in English, as far as I know). Plus the common language for non-German tourists is English. It’s not just spoken by native English speakers, but Spanish, Italian, Czech tourists and so on.

From what i did see and try to understand of the museum it was oddly curated and just seemed to be repetitive of other exhibits I’ve seen before. Some of the public health posters for HIV prevention, for example, were interesting to see.

If you have limited time in Dresden, skip...

Museum is pretty good but felt quite unwelcome as English speakers. The reception woman just shouted in German at my wife when she didn't understand the directions to the lift and then in the museum the entry guard lady confiscated my 4 year old daughters tree leaf and 3 year olds feather! As they were 'forbidden' to take in! Then as the English family we seemed to get a special detail of curator women following my kids around acting like they were somehow going to rob the place! This culminated with one curator following my daughters into a corner where they were looking at the exhibits and it was so obvious she was hunting them that the lady had to pretended to be inspecting the integrity of a plastic moulded brail sign next to my daughters repeatedly for 10 minutes until we moved on! Was like a comedy sketch - except smiling was verboten!

In summary nice exhibits, good museum, but god knows where they dug up the staff. I recommend a half day hospitality and tourism...

This museum is better than you'd anticipate. The exhibits are much funner and more interactive than at most German museums. And because it's such an old museum (it was opened in 1912), it also doesn't disappoint in the category of weird old medical equipment and teaching aids, including the fabulous transparent man and woman. Their range of temporary exhibits are really cool too. Despite what I was warned, there's not actually too much here to make the typical visitor squeamish. I went on a weekday morning, and there was no queue. Unlike most museums in Dresden, this one does not require you to book a time slot before visiting (hurray!). It's not exactly a part of Dresden's old-city charm, and the German Hygiene Museum would not be near the top of my list of must-see places in Dresden. Still, it's an historic museum that had to survive and rebuild after the bombing in World War II just like the rest...