Naum Lazarevich Gurvich (Наум Лазаревич Гурвич) (April 15, 1905 – 1981) was a

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

-Jewish cardiac physician, a pioneer in the development of

defibrillator Defibrillation is a treatment for life-threatening cardiac arrhythmias, specifically ventricular fibrillation (V-Fib) and non-perfusing ventricular tachycardia (V-Tach). A defibrillator delivers a dose of electric current (often called a ''coun ...

s.Igor R. Efimov
"Naum Lazarevich Gurvich (1905–1981) and his contribution to the history of defibrillation"
Cardiol J. 2009; 16(2): 190–193.

Biography

Naum Gurvich was born in the village of Timkovichi near

Minsk Minsk ( be, Мінск ; russian: Минск) is the capital and the largest city of Belarus, located on the Svislach and the now subterranean Niamiha rivers. As the capital, Minsk has a special administrative status in Belarus and is the admi ...

, Russian Empire. Early successful experiments of successful defibrillation by the discharge of a capacitor performed on animals were reported by N. L. Gurvich and G. S. Yunyev in 1939. In 1947 their works were reported in western medical journals. Serial production of Gurvich's pulse defibrillator started in 1952, model ИД-1-ВЭИ (the abbreviation stands for "импульсный дефибриллятор 1, Всесоюзный электротехнический институт", "pulse defibrillator 1,

All-Union Electrotechnical Institute The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...

; the device was manufactured by the electromechanical plant of the Institute). It is described in detail in Gurvich's 1957 book, ''Heart Fibrillation and Defibrillation''. In 1958, US senator

Hubert H. Humphrey Hubert Horatio Humphrey Jr. (May 27, 1911 – January 13, 1978) was an American pharmacist and politician who served as the 38th vice president of the United States from 1965 to 1969. He twice served in the United States Senate, representing Mi ...

visited

Nikita Khrushchev Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev (– 11 September 1971) was the First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964 and chairman of the country's Council of Ministers from 1958 to 1964. During his rule, Khrushchev s ...

and among other things he visited the Moscow Institute of Reanimatology led by Vladimir Negovsky(For many years, V.A. Negovsky had been supervising N.L. Gurvich at the Experimental Physiology and Resuscitation Laboratory, USSR Academy of Medical Sciences. V.A. Negovsky deserves a separate Wikipedia entry (see, for example, Peter Safar "Vladimir A. Negovsky the father of reanimatology, Resuscitation 49 (2001) 223-229, also the entry in russian - "Неговский, Владимир Александрович")., where, among others (The visit of senator Humphrey to the Laboratory is not described accurately. At that moment, the name of the Laboratory was the Experimental Physiology and Resuscitation Laboratory. In 1986, the name was changed to the Institute of General Reanimatology, USSR Academy of Medical Sciences (the term "reanimation" was introduced into clinical practice by V.A. Negovsky in 1961). The aim of the visit was a discussion with V.A. Negovsky, rather than with N.L. Gurvich. During the discussion, V.A. Negovsky was offered to move the Laboratory to the USA, which he rejected.), he met with Gurvich. Humphrey immediately recognized the importance of reanimation research and after that a number of American doctors visited Gurvich. At the same time, Humphrey worked on establishing of a federal program in the

National Institute of Health The National Institutes of Health, commonly referred to as NIH (with each letter pronounced individually), is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in the late 1 ...

in physiology and medicine, telling to the Congress: "Let’s compete with U.S.S.R. in research on reversibility of death".Humphrey HH. An important phase of world medical research: Let’s compete with U.S.S.R. in research on reversibility of death. Congressional Records. 1962 October 13;:A7837–A7839 In 1970 Gurvich was among the group awarded the

USSR State Prize The USSR State Prize (russian: links=no, Государственная премия СССР, Gosudarstvennaya premiya SSSR) was the Soviet Union's state honor. It was established on 9 September 1966. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, t ...

in science and technology "за предложение, разработку и внедрение в медицинскую практику ЭИТ аритмий сердца" (for the proposal, development and introduction into medical practice of electropulse therapy cardioversion_.html" ;"title="cardioversion.html" ;"title="cardioversion">cardioversion ">cardioversion.html" ;"title="cardioversion">cardioversion /small> of cardiac arrhythmias.)

Biography

References

Further reading