Semen Semenovich Zimnitskii

Born Dec. 12 (24), 1873, in the village of Khislavichi, in present-day Smolensk Oblast; died Dec. 10, 1927, in Kazan. Russian internist.

Zimnitskii graduated from the Military Medical Academy in 1898 and defended his doctoral dissertation in 1901. He worked under the guidance of I. P. Pavlov and S. S. Botkin. In 1902–03 he went abroad to further study therapeutics, physiological chemistry, pathological anatomy, bacteriology, and immunology; he worked in the laboratory of I. I. Mechnikov. He headed the subdepartment of special pathology and therapy of the medical department of the University of Kazan (from 1906) and simultaneously the subdepartment of infectious diseases of the Kazan Institute of Advanced Medical Training (from 1924). He studied the clinical aspects of so-called Manchurian typhus (murine rickettsiosis). He proposed an original functional diagnostic kidney test (Zimnitskii’ s test) and the diagnostic method of the double-bouillon test meal. He proposed the acidotic theory of gastric and duodenal ulcers. A number of Zimnitskii’s works are devoted to the clinical aspects and treatment of endocarditis, hypertension, kidney diseases, dyskinesia of the bile-excreting pathways, tuberculosis, and pulmonary diseases.