Theodor Bil’roth - gastric surgery founder

Abstract

More than a century has passed since the death of the great German surgeon Christian Albert Theodor Billroth. Despite such an impressive time, he is still widely known in the surgical community as the founder of gastric surgery, whose results of many years of work have largely influenced the development of abdominal surgery in the XIX-XX centuries. This person combined the features of a talented surgeon, teacher and organizer in equal measure. Thanks to strict adherence to aseptic rules, Theodor Billroth was the first to begin surgical interventions in anatomical areas, previously considered«forbidden» due to the high frequency of purulent-septic complications. Over the seven years he spent as head of the Zurich surgical clinic, the Billroth contributed to its significant expansion and modernization. He first introduced into the clinical practice statistics of surgical interventions and their results, thereby taking another step from the surgical craft to art and science. Being a versatile person, one of the brightest personality traits of Theodore Billroth was artistry, which was equally manifested both at the operating table and at the piano keyboard, because he, among other things, was a gifted pianist and violinist. In his life and work, he did not oppose science and art. As a scientist-innovator, professor Billroth was the first to perform successful interventions on organs previously considered to be inaccessible to operative effects, thus opening a fundamentally new page in the history of abdominal surgery.