Academician Nikolai Nikolaevich Priorov (1885–1961) (on the 140th anniversary of his birth)

An outstanding traumatologist and orthopedist, the founder of Russian prosthetics, the creator of a large scientific school, the organizer of specialized traumatological and orthopedic care in the USSR, Academician of the USSR Academy of Medical Sciences, Honored Scientist of the RSFSR, Professor Nikolai Nikolaevich Priorov was born on May 28 (June 10, new style), 1885 in the small town of Shenkursk, Arkhangelsk province, in the family of an official of the Arkhangelsk postal and Telegraph office. He graduated from the Petrozavodsk Theological College, then – the Arkhangelsk Theological Seminary, and in 1907, entered the Medical Faculty of the Imperial Tomsk University. Having received his doctor’s degree with honors in June 1913, N.N. Priorov worked at the Soldatenkov Hospital (now the Botkin Moscow City Clinical Hospital) under the supervision of renowned Professor V. N. Rozanov from 1913 to 1915, and then from 1919 to 1927. At the same time, from 1916 to 1921, he was in charge of the orthopedic department and served as chief physician of the Central Hospital for Crippled Soldiers. He actively participated in the organization of prosthetic workshops and a prosthetic factory in Moscow. From 1921 to the end of his life, N. N. Priorov was the director of the Medical Prosthetic Institute that he founded in Moscow, which became the Central Research Institute of Traumatology and Orthopedics (CITO) in 1940. In 1931, on the basis of the Institute, he organized the Department of Orthopedics and Traumatology of the Central Institute for Advanced Medical Training, which he headed almost until the end of his life. From 1933 to 1938, he simultaneously headed the Department of Traumatology and Orthopedics at the 1st Moscow Medical Institute. From 1945 to 1947, he served as Deputy Minister of Health of the USSR.N. N. Priorov made a great contribution to the creation of the state program for injury prevention and occupational safety, to the organization of specialized orthopedic care for children, is rightfully considered the founder of Russian sports traumatology. N. N. Priorov was the author and co-author of more than 250 scientific papers, 65 PhD and doctoral dissertations were completed under his leadership. In 1932, on his initiative, the Society of Traumatologists and Orthopedists of Moscow and the Moscow Region was organized, and in 1946, the All–Union Society of Orthopedic Traumatologists was organized, of which he was the permanent chairman until the end of his life. Academician N. N. Priorov died on April 15, 1961 and was buried at the Novodevichy Cemetery in Moscow. The street in Moscow and the passage in Arkhangelsk are named after N. N. Priyorov. The National Medical Research Center of Traumatology and Orthopedics (CITO) in Moscow, the Shenkurskaya Central District Hospital in the Arkhangelsk Region and the leading specialized journal Bulletin of Traumatology and Orthopedics bear his name.