Sergey Spasokukotsky

SPASOKUKOTSKY, Sergey Ivanovich (born 1870), a prominent Russian surgeon. Upon graduating from Moscow University in 1893, he completed his residency in municipal hospitals. In 1912, he was elected professor of the Department of Surgery at Saratov University, and in 1926 he was invited to the Department of Surgery of the 2nd Moscow State University. Already at the beginning of his surgical activity, Spasokukotsky was noted at Russian congresses as an outstanding surgeon possessing a rich technique and original thinking. Over a 40-year period, he published up to 80 scientific works dedicated to the development of various chapters of surgery. His monograph "Injuries and Diseases of the Lower Leg" was published as a section of "Russian Surgery" (edited by P. Dyakonov, A. Levshin, and others, vol. VI, Petrograd, 1916). He is the founder of Russian gastrointestinal surgery, the development of which he is engaged in to the present time. Spasokukotsky was the first, back in 1909, to introduce the social factor into surgery in a work on volvulus as a disease of a starving person. He was the first to introduce the prophylaxis of purulent diseases, proposing the airtight suturing of gunshot wounds of the skull and abdominal cavity in cases of visceral damage, and the treatment of purulent echinococcosis by a closed method. Spasokukotsky provided a new accessible method of hand washing that reduces suppuration, which is currently adopted by the majority of surgeons in the USSR ("Deep disinfection of hands with the abandonment of soap," Noviy Khirurgicheskiy Arkhiv, vol. XVI, book 2, 1928). Associated with his name are also the conservative treatment of purulent diseases and the development of surgical treatment of purulent diseases of the lungs. A distinctive feature of all his works is their relevance to the present time, regardless of the time of publication. Spasokukotsky is an outstanding educator who created his own surgical school, which produced a number of professors currently holding surgical chairs.

From the very first days of the revolution, Spasokukotsky actively engaged in social work, organizing a traumatological institute in Saratov for the rehabilitation and restoration of working capacity of wounded Red Army soldiers. Since 1927, he has headed the surgical sector of the Blood Transfusion Institute, presenting a number of works on blood transfusion, the use of cadaveric and utilization blood, blood preservation, and the transport of preserved blood—problems of defensive significance. Spasokukotsky serves as assistant chairman of the commission for the creation of military-sanitary institutions of the air fleet, an active worker of the Red Cross for military-sanitary defense, a worker of the People's Commissariat of Social Welfare on prosthetic matters, etc. In 1934, by a decree of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR, Spasokukotsky received the title of Honored Worker of Science.