Director of Kharkov Pharmaceutical Institute, 1931-1935
Nikolay Ivanovich Pirogov was born on 20 September 1897 in Aleksandrovka village (now Dolinsky district, Kirovograd region). He studied at the parochial school (one year), then at the two year Dolinsky railway school, at Odessa city six year specialized school of G.S.Mikhaylov-Muchkin and Kherson military paramedic school. During the First World War (December 1914 – December 1917) he served as a paramedic in the ambulance car of the 24th division. In 1918 he voluntarily joined the first Belarusian divisionb named after Lenin, from where he was transferred to work as a medical assistant to the evacuation post.
In 1919, Nikolay Ivanovich took the exams for six classes of high school without attending classes and started to work as a secretary in healthcare workers’ union. In 1920, he studied at the CentralPartySchool of the Central Committee of the Communist Party (Bolshevik) in Kharkov. From 1920 to 1924 he took the elective post in Odessa regional department of Medical and Sanitary Work (Medsantrud): from February 1920 to February 1922, he was a secretary in the office of this Union, from March 1922 to October 1924 he was its head.
Through Medical and Sanitary Work (Medsantrud) N.I. Pirogov was transferred to Kharkov (the then capital of Soviet Ukraine), where from 1924 to 1928 he was a member of the Presidium and head of organization department of All Ukrainian committee of Medical and Sanitary Work (Medsantrud), and from 1928 to 1930 he was a secretary of Kharkov district branch of Medical and Sanitary Work (Medsantrud).
At the beginning of 1931, N.I. Pirogov was appointed a director of Kharkov Pharmaceutical Institute (KhPhI). During the directorship, he paid a great attention to the expansion of training facilities, formation of academic teaching staff, improvement of the curricula and teaching methods. He actively continued his educational work.
Under the leadership of Nikolay Ivanovich Pirogov professors and teachers of the institute actively developed new principles of higher pharmaceutical education. At the initiative of KhPhI employees and with their active participation at the All-Ukrainian Conference on Pharmaceutical Education in 1932 the curriculum for graduate students has been prepared and approved. The conference assigned KhPhI, under this curriculum, to create a training program for graduate and introduce it into the learning process in 1933.
Led by Nikolay Ivanovich Pirogov KhPhI gradually became one of the leading pharmaceutical universities in Ukraine. For the preparation of highly-qualified personnel was important to organize not only learning process, but also general training of future students.
Perfectionism, professionalism, deep decency, scrupulous selection of staff these are the features that helped N.I. Pirogov to restructure the work of the institute.
In the first half of the 30’s, KhPhI continued to expand; its organizational and methodological structure was improved. In 1932 was created a new Department: Microbiology.
Gradually, the institute was not only training base, but also a center of research work. Despite the relatively modest level of technical equipment, in 1935 the institute conducted researches on 7 scientific topics. All the achievements of the institute were a considerable contribution of the director N.I. Pirogov.
