During the first twenty years Barát spent at the Erzsébet Sanatorium (from 1924 to 1944), women were gradually given more and more opportunity. As a result of expanding job categories created in the capitalist economy, women—formerly relegated to the schoolteacher’s profession—appeared in clerical administrative positions, and the number of female university graduates began to climb. In 1936, a columnist for the daily Pesti Napló asked outstanding female professionals, artists and intellectuals if they found it difficult to realize their potential in their careers as women. Gizi Bajor answered that, in the medical field, only the most gifted women could achieve success. These select few included Irén Barát, “whose expertise won accolades even among men.” Bajor’s singling out her friend as an example was entirely justified and well-deserved. Barát had given ample evidence of her professional excellence in reviews of medical literature and studies of her own in a variety of professional journals, including Orvosi Hetilap, Népegészségügy, Orvosképzés, Orvosok Lapja, Magyar Orvosi Archívum, Tuberkulózis, Therapia Hungarica, and Gyógyászat, among others. From 1925 to 1930, Barát edited publications for the Tuberculosis Society of Hungarian Physicians, gave lectures, and delivered addresses at several industry conferences and committee sessions. She did not retreat even during the siege of Budapest but got busy sharing her experiences on lung damage caused by the war. The talk she gave at the Hungarian Physicians’ Holy Week in Balatonfüred in 1925 was received enthusiastically in professional circles. Barát was also a regular and active participant in medical training. In the 1930s, her favorite topic was the role of work therapy, an approach never before employed in Hungary in the treatment of tuberculosis.