Hamilton earned her medical degree from the University of Michigan Medical School in 1893, launching her career in medicine and public health.
In 1893, Alice Hamilton graduated from the University of Michigan Medical School, one of the few institutions at the time that admitted women to its medical program on equal footing with men. Her decision to pursue medicine was driven partly by a desire for independence and partly by a genuine interest in science, particularly bacteriology and pathology.
After graduating, Hamilton pursued internships at the New England Hospital for Women and Children in Boston and the Hospital for Women and Children in Minneapolis, gaining clinical experience that was often denied to women physicians of the period. She subsequently traveled to Germany to study bacteriology and pathology at the universities of Munich and Leipzig, though she was permitted to attend lectures only on the condition that she remain inconspicuous.
This educational foundation prepared her for a career that would blend clinical medicine, laboratory science, and social reform. Her medical degree was the essential credential that allowed her to later pursue pathology research at Johns Hopkins and, eventually, her pioneering investigations into industrial toxicology. The exact month and day of her graduation ceremony are not recorded in standard biographical sources, but the year 1893 marks a definitive turning point in her professional life.