Nikolai Ivanovich Bystrov

BYSTROV, Nikolai Ivanovich (1841–1906), a well-known pediatrician, the first independent professor of pediatrics in Russia, and an honored professor of the Military Medical Academy. After graduating from the academy in 1864, he was retained there to study children's diseases and worked in the clinics of professors Krasovsky and Florinsky. In 1867–1869, he specialized abroad in the fields of chemistry, pathological anatomy, and children's diseases. From 1870, as a privat-docent, he taught a course on children's diseases, having a department at the obstetrical clinic. From 1874, he was placed in charge of a separate pediatric clinic at the Mikhailovskaya Clinical Hospital as an adjunct professor, and later as an ordinary

professor. This was the first independent chair and clinic of pediatrics in Russia. Bystrov directed the clinic until 1896 and published over 20 scientific works during this time. For a long time, his clinic served as the only place for scientific advancement in pediatrics. More than 55 doctors passed through it, writing over 200 scientific works and more than 20 dissertations; many of these doctors subsequently occupied chairs of pediatrics. Being a man with enormous practical experience, Bystrov created a practical school of pediatricians that was interesting for that time. It was an era of accumulating clinical experience, developing methods of approaching the child, and developing the physiology and pathology of digestion and metabolism. Bystrov was the initiator of the creation of the Society of Pediatricians in St. Petersburg (1875).