Nikolskii, Dmitrii

Born Oct. 25 (Nov. 6), 1855, in Perm’; died June 26, 1918, in Petrograd. Russian hygienist and public figure. Doctor of medicine (1897).

In 1800, Nikol’skii graduated from the St. Petersburg Medical and Surgical Academy. He worked as a zemstvo (district and provincial assembly) and factory physician and as a sanitary inspector. He was the first in Russia to teach courses in occupational hygiene and first aid in the Mining (from 1897), Technological (from 1902), and Polytechnical (from 1904) institutes in St. Petersburg. Nikol’skii called for improvement in the living and working conditions of workers, the organization of sanitary inspection in factories—independent of the factory employers—and the creation of a special inspection to investigate women’s working conditions in factories.

At the second Pirogov Congress, Nikol’skii advocated the obligatory teaching of occupational hygiene in medical faculties. On Nikol’skii’s initiative, a commission for labor protection was established as part of the Society for the Protection of Public Health. Nikol’skii headed this commission as well as a commission for the dissemination of information about hygiene among the population.

After the October Revolution of 1917, Nikol’skii worked in the Division of Labor Protection of the Petrograd Oblast Department of Labor.