Domestic scientists who made a significant contribution to the study of the digestive system diseases: images in art. Olexander Oleksiyovych Shalimov

Abstract

Olexander Oleksiyovych Shalimov (1918—2006), Academician of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian SSR, Hero of Socialist Labor, laureate of the State Awards of the USSR and the Ukrainian SSR, an Honorary Doctor of the RSFSR, an Honorary Scientist of the Ukrainian SSR, and a famous Soviet scientist and surgeon. He made a great contribution to the development of scientific and practical surgery and to the training of highly qualified personnel.The years spent working in Kharkiv marked the beginning of O. O. Shalimov’s scientific career. The range of his research interests was unusually wide and covered the surgery of the digestive organs, the heart, the main vessels, anesthesiology, resuscitation, etc. Together with his students, he developed and improved techniques for surgical treatment of diseases of the esophagus, peptic ulcer of the stomach and duodenum, liver, and biliary tract. He developed and put into practice a number of original techniques of surgical interventions, such as methods of esophagoplasty, pylorus‑preserving gastric resection, suturing of the duodenal stump, and rational methods of bile duct plastic surgery. O. O. Shalimov made a particularly great contribution to pancreatic surgery. He proposed a new technique of pancreatoduodenal resection for pancreatic cancer and a number of surgeries for the treatment of various forms of chronic pancreatitis.The Kyiv period of O. O. Shalimov’s life was characterized by further in‑depth study of diseases of the digestive and cardiovascular systems and the development of methods for their surgical treatment, the widespread introduction of the results of scientific developments into healthcare practice, and active work to improve surgical care for the population of the republic. The Institute headed by him (the leading institution in the republic in the field of surgery) had become not only one of the leading surgical institutions in the state but also a school of highly qualified personnel and a medical advisory, organizational, and methodological center of Ukraine. The result of the activity of O. O. Shalimov is that Ukraine has become a leader in the application of organ‑preserving surgeries at present.The works by O. O. Shalimov on pancreatic surgery are of particular interest. For many years, this organ was considered inaccessible to surgeons, since the resulting complications, as a rule, nullified all the efforts of surgeons. O. O. Shalimov was one of the path‑breakers in the development of techniques for the surgical treatment of pancreatic diseases. He devoted more than four decades to this work, achieving significant success and gaining high prestige as a pancreatic surgeon. The research results by O. O. Shalimov are reflected in 712 publications, including 24 monographs and three atlases. He was the author of 92 inventions. There are more than 40 doctors and 80 candidates of sciences among the numerous students of O. O. Shalimov.