Alexander Nikolaevich BAKULEV - Soviet surgeon-scientist, the founder of cardiovascular surgery in the USSR (to the 130th of birthday)
Authors: Andreev Alexander Alexeevich , Ostroushko Anton Petrovich 
Published: September 2020

Alexander Bakulev was born in the village Nebankovskaya Vyatka province. He studied first at the parish school, and then at the Vyatka theological Seminary. In 1911 he entered the medical faculty of Saratov University. In 1918, he passed the exams for a doctor's degree ahead of schedule and remained in the hospital surgery clinic of the University. In 1926 A. N. Bakulev entered the residency at the Department of surgery of the 2nd Moscow medical Institute. In 1928 he successfully defended his thesis and was sent for a one-year internship in Germany. For the first time in the domestic practice, he proposed the introduction of radiopaque substances in the brain tissue, a method of ureteral transplantation, improved methods of x-ray examination of vessels, kidneys and ureters, developed methods of plastic esophagus (1935), surgery on the biliary tract, methods of surgical treatment of peptic ulcer, for the first time in the world surgically eliminated the fixation of the heart muscle to the heart bag with pericarditis, developed new methods of treatment of brain abscesses. A. N. Bakulev is considered a pioneer of intubation anesthesia in the USSR, the founder of thoracic and radical pulmonary surgery. He performed a successful lobectomy for chronic abscess (1938) and lung actinomycosis (1939). In 1943 A. N. Bakulev became head of the Department. During the great Patriotic war A. N. Bakulev - front, and then chief surgeon of the evacuation hospitals of Moscow, head of the surgical Department of the hospital medical and sanitary Department of the Kremlin. He successfully removed a lung from a patient with chronic suppurative process (1945), for the first time carried out a successful operation in nezaradene known to inhibit the Bayou (1948), have developed a method comissurotomy. In 1949, A. N. Bakulev was awarded the Stalin prize (1949). He was the first to impose an anastomosis between the superior Vena cava and pulmonary artery, performed surgery for aneurysm of the thoracic aorta, created a technology of heart operations in hypothermia, for the first time in the world he began to operate on children suffering from congenital heart defects. In 1955 on the initiative of A. N. Bakuleva was established Institute of thoracic surgery (now the Institute of cardiovascular surgery. A. N. Bakuleva), the first Director of which he became. Among his developments can be noted the method of electrocardio-stimulation, intended for the treatment of heart rhythm disorders, a method of plasty of coronary vessels in acute myocardial infarction. In the mid-fifties A. N. Bakulev lays the foundations of shunting operations on the vessels of the heart. In 1957 he was awarded the Lenin prize. In 1959 A. N. Bakulev performed a successful operation for valvular stenosis of the pulmonary artery. In 1958, the scientist was elected a full member of the USSR Academy of Sciences. From 1953 to 1960 President of the USSR Academy of Sciences. A. N. Bakulev was awarded three orders of Lenin, the order of the red banner of Labor and the red Star, was awarded the highest international award of surgeons the award "Golden scalpel". On March 31, 1967, Alexander Bakulev died suddenly from cardiac arrest and was buried at Novodevichy cemetery. In memory of Alexander Nikolaevich in 2005, a documentary film "the Key to the heart" was shot in front of the Institute of cardiovascular surgery named after A. N. Bakulev monument to the scientist, and the building a plaque.