Pavel Kondoidi

Born June 24, 1710, in Corfu; died Aug. 30, 1760, at Petergof (present-day Petrodvorets). Russian physician; organizer of the medical service of the Russian Army. Honorary member of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences (1754).

Kondoidi graduated from the medical school of the University of Leiden in 1733. He joined the military medical service of the Russian Army in 1735. He became a general-staff doctor with the field forces in 1738 and chief director of the General Staff Medical Office and Medical Department in 1754. Kondoidi created Russia’s first mobile hospital. He introduced special education for midwives, founding schools for them in Moscow and St. Petersburg (1757). He determined the length of training for hospital schools and broadened and deepened the program of instruction. He introduced clinical instruction and the post of docent and introduced the case history as an essential document. He regulated mandatory autopsy and improved prosection. He had Russian doctors sent abroad for advanced study, which resulted in the creation of a native group of teachers for Russia’s higher medical schools. He compiled the first Russian pharmacopoeia for field pharmacies and military physicians. He organized scientific medical conferences, founded Russia’s first medical society, and established the first public medical library (under the auspices of the Medical Office).