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Nikolai Pirogov
Nikolai Ivanovich Pirogov, the great Russian surgeon and one of the most outstanding personalities in Russian medicine was born on Nowember 25, 1810. At the age of 14 Pirogov enrolled as a student in the medical Faculty of Moscow University and 3 years later he got his doctor’s diploma. As one of the best graduaters he was sent to Tartu to take a special course. Pirogov brilliantly completed the course and in 1833 very successfully defended his thesis for the degree of Doctor of medicine. Then he became professor and head of the majour surgical clinic at the University of Tartu. A few years later he was elected professor of the Medico-Surgical academy of St.Petersburg. There his talent developed in full.
At that time anasthesia was unknown for surgery and as a result even minor operations caused patients immeasurable suffering. At times they caused their death. Then in 1840 ether was first used in an operation carried out in Boston, USA. Pirogov was one of the first to appreciate the tremendous importance of discovery. However he made many experiments with animals and tested the effect of the ether on himself and on his associates before using it as an anaesthetic in the clinic. It was only after he was convinced that ether anasthesia was absolutely harmless that he began to use it on a wide scale in his operations. Then Pirogov tested and began using another anaesthetic - chloroform. It was Pirogov who paved the way in Russia for the scientific use of anaesthesia.
He was the first surgeon to make a wide of anaesthesia in field hospitals. This was in Caucasus in 1847. Pirogov was the first to open the door to the bacteriological era in medicine. Even before the discovery made by Louis Paster he had correctly defined the cause of inflammation and pus formation after an operation. To prevent wound infection Pirogov used substances all of which are still used by surgeons. During the Crimean War Pirogov was very active. Workng under eneny fire and risking his life, he gave assistance to wounded soldiers and officers. In besieged Sevastopol Pirogov worked out principles for giving medical assistance at the front. Pirogov was the first medical man in Russia to use nurses to care for sick and wounded in the field.
He greatly appreciated their modest and noble work. This outstanding surgeon and scientist was also a prominent public figure. He devoted much of his time to the training and education of the younger generation. His ideals and his active methods of teaching were widely appreciated and adopted in Russia and other countries and profoundly influenced the development of the system of public education.
