N.I. Pirogov and his proverbial: «I believe in hygiene»

The great doctor, anatomist, surgeon, teacher, professor Nikolai Ivanovich Pirogov (1810-1881) glorified not only Russian medicine, but also Russia as a whole. His discoveries and achievements relate primarily to the anatomy and its topographic direction, surgery and its military field, the military medical «administration” is the organization of medical support for the army. The vast majority of scientific results were achieved by Professor N.I. Pirogov during his work at the Imperial Medical and Surgical Academy from December 1840 to July 1856. Among all his wonderful quotes and expressions, the words «I believe in hygiene» and «The future belong to preservative medicine» gained the most popularity. They were published in Russian in his fundamental work «The Beginnings of General Military Field Surgery, Taken from Observations of Military Hospital Practice and Memoirs of the Crimean War and the Caucasian Expedition» in 1865. For more than 150 years, these phrases continue to be quoted by doctors of many specialties. . The question of what meaning Nikolay Ivanovich invested in these winged words and served as the reason for this article. To understand the great scientist’s judgments, his words «individuality» and «fatalism», which preceded these historical phrases, are analyzed. The sources of knowledge and experience of hygiene of the first half of the XIX century, which N.I. could use Pirogov since, until 1865, neither in Europe nor in Russia did hygiene acquire the status of an independent science, its provisions were based on empirical information received by doctors in both peacetime and wartime. With full confidence, it can be argued that the highest authority of N.I. Pirogov and his catch phrase «I believe in hygiene» served as a powerful incentive for the development of all hygiene science.