Founder of Soviet neurosurgery and Chief Surgeon of the Red Army
During an air raid, he refused to take shelter, replying: "The wounded cannot hide. A doctor's place is beside the patient's bed."
Nikolai Burdenko founded Soviet neurosurgery and served as Chief Surgeon of the Red Army through the Great Patriotic War, serving in four wars and revolutionizing field surgery. He abandoned the priesthood for medicine, volunteered for the Russo-Japanese War, and was shot carrying wounded under fire, earning the Cross of St. George. In 1932 he created the world's first Central Neurosurgical Institute in Moscow, pioneered brain-tumor surgery, and developed bulbotomy. As Surgeon-General from 1937, he performed thousands of front-line operations, introduced penicillin, and oversaw a service that returned 72.3% of wounded to duty without a single epidemic. He became the first president of the USSR Academy of Medical Sciences in 1944. He died in 1946 at seventy, having suffered three strokes but completing his final report from his hospital bed.
Career Timeline
- 1904–1905Medical orderly, Russo-Japanese War; shot saving wounded, Cross of St. George
- 1906–1910Graduated Yuryev University with distinction; Doctor of Medicine; trained in Germany and Switzerland
- 1910–1917Professor of surgery, Yuryev University; Red Cross consultant, Northwestern Front; Surgeon-Consultant, 2nd Army; Chief Military Sanitary Inspector (Mar–May 1917)
- 1918–1923Professor of surgery, Voronezh University; organized Red Army hospitals, field-surgery courses, Pirogov Medical Society
- 1923–1937Prof. of surgery, Moscow State Univ./1st Moscow Medical Inst.; founded neurosurgical department
- 1932Founded world's first Central Neurosurgical Institute, Moscow; director
- 1937–1946Chief Surgeon of the Red Army; Winter War & Great Patriotic War; thousands of operations; introduced penicillin
- 1944–1946First President, USSR Academy of Medical Sciences