Biography of Professor Pirogov
Latest news biography Biography of Nikolai Pirogov, whom contemporaries dubbed a “wonderful doctor” - a vivid example of selfless service to medical science. A myriad of discoveries that saved the lives of thousands of people are still used in medicine. Childhood and youth the future genius of world medicine was born in a large family of an official of the military department. Nikolai had thirteen brothers and sisters, many of whom died in infancy.
Father Ivan Ivanovich was educated and achieved great success in his career. He took a good flexible girl from an old merchant family in his wife, who became the housewife and mother of their many children. Parents paid special attention to raising children: boys determined to study in prestigious institutions, and the girls received education at home. The portrait of Nikolai Pirogov, the Pirogov family loved to read and had an impressive library in the house.
Parents lived together and pious, every Sunday the family visited the church, followed posts and honored religious holidays. There were many doctors among the guests of the Khlebsol Parental House, who willingly played with the curious Nikolai and told entertaining stories from practice. Therefore, from an early age, he decided to become either a military man, as a father, or a doctor, like their home doctor Mukhin, with whom the boy made friends a lot.
Nikolai grew a capable child, early learned to read and sat in his father's library for days. From the age of eight, teachers began to be invited to him, and at eleven he was sent to the private boarding house of Moscow. Nikolai Pirogov in childhood soon began material difficulties in the family: the eldest son Ivan Ivanovich Peter was seriously lost, but his father had a waste, which was to be covered from his own funds.
Therefore, the children had to be taken from prestigious boarding houses and transferred to home schooling. Family Dr. Mukhin, who has long noticed Nikolai's abilities for medicine, contributed to the university at the medical faculty. For a gifted young man, they made an exception, and he became a student at fourteen, and not at sixteen, as the rules demanded. Nikolai combined his studies with work at the anatomical theater, where he received invaluable experience in surgery and finally decided on the choice of further profession.
After graduating from the University of Pirogov, medicine and pedagogy were sent to the city of Derpt now Tartu, where he worked at the local university for five years and at twenty -two years defended his doctoral dissertation. Pirogov’s scientific work was translated into German, and soon they became interested in in Germany. The talented doctor was invited to Berlin, where Pirogov worked with leading German surgeons for two years.
The young Nikolai Pirogov returning to his homeland, the man hoped to receive the department at Moscow University, but it was occupied by another person who had the necessary connections. Therefore, Pirogov remained in Derpt and immediately became famous throughout the district with fantastic skill. Nikolai Ivanovich easily took up the most difficult operations that no one had yet done before him, describing the details in the pictures.
Soon, Pirogov becomes a professor of surgery and leaves for France to examine local clinics. The establishments did not impress him, and Nikolai Ivanovich found the eminent Parisian surgeon to read his monograph. The surgical instruments of Nikolai Pirogov, upon returning to Russia, were invited to head the Department of Surgery at the Medical and Surgical Academy of St.
Petersburg, and soon Pirogov opened the first surgical hospital with a thousand beds. In St. Petersburg, the doctor worked for 10 years and during this time he wrote scientific works on applied surgery and anatomy. Nikolai Ivanovich invented and controlled the manufacture of the necessary medical instruments, continuously operated on in his own hospital and consulted in other clinics, and at night he worked in an anatomist, often in antisanitarian conditions.
The anatomical institute in St. Petersburg could not but affect the state of health of the doctor. The news helped to get to your feet that the highest command of the sovereign approved the project of the world's first anatomical institute, on which Pirogov worked in recent years. Soon, the first successful operation was carried out using ether anesthesia, which was a breakthrough in world medical science, and a masked mask designed by Pirogov is still used in medicine.
Nikolai Pirogov in the war in the year Nikolai Ivanovich leaves for the Caucasian War to experience scientific developments in the field. There, he carried out ten thousand operations using anesthesia, put in practice the bandages he had invented, soaked in starch, which became the prototype of the modern gypsum dressing. In the fall of the year, Pirogov with a group of doctors and nurses went to the Crimean War, where he became the main surgeon in Sevastopol surrounded by the enemy.
Thanks to the efforts of the sisters of mercy he created, a huge number of Russian soldiers and officers were saved.He developed a completely new system for evacuation, transportation and sorting of wounded in combat conditions, thus laying the foundations of modern military field medicine. Nikolai Pirogov operated on the field, upon returning to St. Petersburg, Nikolai Ivanovich met with the emperor and shared his thoughts on the problems and shortcomings of the Russian army.
Alexander II was angry with the impudent doctor and did not want to listen to him. Since then, Pirogov fell out of disgrace at court and was appointed trustee of the Odessa and Kyiv districts. He directed his activities to reform the system of existing school education, which again caused the dissatisfaction of the authorities. The sick and suffering gathered to the “wonderful doctor” from all over Russia.
The estate of Nikolai Pirogov did not leave scientific activity either, writing in the cherry work on military field surgery that glorified his name. Pirogov went abroad, where he took part in scientific conferences and seminars, and during one of the trips he was asked to provide medical assistance to Garibaldi himself. Nikolai Pirogov examines the young Dmitry Mendeleev Emperor Alexander II again remembered the famous surgeon during the Russo-Turkish war and asked him to join the military campaign.
Pirogov agreed on the condition that he would not interfere and limit the freedom of action. Arriving in Bulgaria, Nikolai Ivanovich took up the organization of military hospitals, having drove seven hundred kilometers in three months and visiting twenty settlements. For this, the Emperor granted him the Order of the White Eagle and a gold tobacker with diamonds, decorated with a portrait of the autocrat.
In recent years, the great scientist devoted to medical practice and writing the “Diary of an old doctor”, having finished him before his death. Their marriage lasted only four years, the wife died of complications of heavy births, leaving behind two sons. Nikolai Pirogov and his wife are listening to the game of Peter Ilya Tchaikovsky, after eight years, Nikolai Ivanovich married Baroness Alexandra von Bistrum, a relative of the illustrious navigator Kruzenshtern.
She became a faithful assistant and ally, her efforts opened a surgical clinic in Kyiv.
Death to the cause of Pirogov’s death was a malignant tumor that appeared on the oral mucosa. He was examined by the best doctors of the Russian Empire, but could not help. The great surgeon died in the winter of the year in Cherry. Relatives said that at the time of the agony of the dying, a lunar eclipse happened. The wife of the deceased decided to embalm his body, and, having received permission from the Orthodox Church, invited Pirogov David Podtsev, who had long been engaged in this topic.
The mummy of Nikolai Pirogov was placed in a special crypt with a window, over which the church was later erected. After the revolution, it was decided to preserve the body of a great scientist and carry out work to restore it. The war prevented these plans, and the first rebels was carried out only in the year by specialists of Moscow, Leningrad and Kharkov. The museum in the house of Nikolai Pirogov Pirogov’s estate has survived to the present day, the museum of the great scientist has now been organized there.
It annually hold Pirogov readings dedicated to the surgeon’s contribution to world medicine, and international medical conferences are gathering.