Girey Bairov
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Girey Bairov | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | 2 May 1922 |
| Died | 6 July 1999 (aged 77) |
| Alma mater | First Moscow State Medical University Saratov State Medical University |
| Awards | USSR State Prize (1979)[1] |
Girey Alievich Bairov (Russian: Гирей Алиевич Баиров; 2 May 1922 – 6 July 1999) was a Crimean Tatar pediatric surgeon in the Soviet Union; he was one of the founders of pediatric surgery in Leningrad and later became head of the Department of Pediatric Surgery at the Leningrad/Saint Petersburg State Pediatric Medical University. In 1963 he became a corresponding member of the Soviet Academy of Medical Sciences.[2]
Bairov was born on 2 May 1922 in Alushta to a family of academics. His father, Ali Memetovich Beirov, was a schoolteacher, while both his maternal and paternal grandfathers were doctors.[3][4] As a child he dreamed of becoming a pilot, and after graduating school in 1938 he passed the entrance exams to be accepted into the Moscow Aviation Institute, but changed his plans and chose to attend the First Moscow State Medical University instead. In autumn 1941, after the German invasion of the Soviet Union, the school was evacuated to Ufa, but Bairov moved to Saratov where he continued his studies at the military faculty of the Saratov Medical Institute.[5] After graduating, he was deployed to the front lines as an army doctor in a motor-rifle battalion of the 135th Tank Brigade in February 1943. In July that year, he was seriously wounded during the crossing of the Seversky Donets river of the Izyum-Barvenkovo Offensive. During the battle, he provided first aid to an estimated 400 soldiers and officers, personally carrying 35 that were seriously wounded off the battlefield with their weapons. Despite sustaining wounds to the head, leg, and arm he continued to lead the group of medical instructors and orderlies in the heat of battle for over three hours.[6] While being treated at the military field hospital in Kantemirovka, he met his future wife Vera Semyonovna, a surgeon at the hospital. It was there in Kantemirovka that Bairov participated in his first pediatric surgery, despite being on crutches at the time. Upon recovering from his injuries he returned to active duty and was posted as a surgeon to a military field hospital, where he remained until transferring to Leningrad in 1945.[7]
