Boris Vasilyevich Petrovsky (Russian: Борис Васильевич Петровский; 27 June 1908 – 4 May 2004) was a Soviet and Russian general surgeon who was the health minister of the Soviet Union in the period 1965–1980.
Early life and education
Petrovsky was born in Yessentuki on 27 June 1908.[1] His parents were Vasily and Lydia Petrovsky.[1] His father was a physician.[2]
Petrovsky applied for the Medicine Faculty of Moscow University, but he was not accepted due to the restricted quota and was transferred to the Engineering Faculty of the same university.[2] However, through the help of Nadezhda Krupskaya, Vladimir Lenin's widow, who was serving as the deputy education minister, Petrovsky managed to enroll to the Medicine Faculty[2] and received a degree in medicine.[3] In 1933 he became a research investigator at the Moscow Institute for Oncology where he received a PhD completing his thesis on the transfusion of blood and blood substitutes in oncology.[3] His second thesis which was required to pursue an academic career was about his experience as a military surgeon during the wars with Finland and Germany.[3]
Career
Petrovsky served in the Red Army as a military surgeon during the wars with Finland in 1939-40 and during World War II with Germany.[3] In 1945 he was appointed deputy director of the Research Institute for Experimental and Clinical Surgery where he extensively studied oesophageal surgery.[3] In 1948 Petrovsky was promoted to the title of professor of general surgery at the Moscow State Medical Institute.[3] In the period between 1949 and 1951 he worked at Budapest University as the chairman of hospital surgery and director of a surgery clinic.[1] Then he was named chief surgeon at the Kremlin Hospital in Moscow.[2] Next he was appointed chairman of surgery at the Moscow Medical Institute and in 1956 he was named the chairman of surgery at the Moscow State Medical Institute.[3]
In 1965 Petrovsky carried out the first kidney transplant in the Soviet Union.[3] In September of the same year he was appointed minister of health.[4] When he was in office, he continued such operations and implemented more than thirty kidney transplants until 1968.[5] During his term the Oath of a Soviet Physician began to be used in 1971 when it was accepted by the Supreme Soviet of which he was a member.[3] On 23 May 1972 Petrovsky and US Secretary of StateWilliam P. Rogers signed a five-year agreement for a cooperative health program.[6]
One of the books written by Petrovsky was published in 1949 entitled Surgical Treatment of Vascular Injuries.[3] In 1995 he published his memoirs, Man. Medicine. Life.[3]
