Polenov, Andrei

Born Apr. 7 (19), 1871, in Moscow; died July 19, 1947, in Leningrad. One of the founders of neurosurgery in the USSR. Academician of the Academy of Medical Sciences of the USSR (1945). Honored Scientist of the RSFSR (1934).

Polenov graduated from the Military Medical Academy in 1896. In 1914 he became a professor in the departments of operative surgery, traumatology, and orthopedics at the St. Petersburg Psychoneurologic Institute. He founded the Petrograd Physiosurgical Institute in 1917 and was its director from 1917 to 1924; in 1921 he established in the institute the first neurosurgical division in the USSR. In 1924 he became director of the traumatological institute he had organized. In 1935, Polenov established and headed the first subdepartment of neurosurgery in the USSR at the Leningrad Institute for the Advanced Training of Physicians. In 1938 he became director of the Leningrad Neurosurgical Institute.

Polenov’s chief works dealt with the surgical treatment of diseases of the peripheral nerves and of the sympathetic nervous system and with surgery of conduction tracts affected by pains or hyperkinesia. Polenov wrote the Atlas of Operations on the Brain and Spinal Cord (State Prize of the USSR, 1946). He was awarded the Order of Lenin, the Order of the Red Banner of Labor, and several medals.