Vladimir Bekhterev and Ludwig Puusepp

Vladimir Mikhailovich Bekhterev (1857-1927)

The first operating room at the neurology department of the Russian Military Medical Academy was established in 1897 by the famous Russian neurologist and psychiatrist Vladimir Bekhterev. According to Bekhterev, neurology should become a surgical speciality like gynaecology or opthalmology and neurologists will take a knife in their hands [1]. He was an outstanding Russian neurologist, psychiatrist, psychologist, morphologist, physiologist authored over 1000 scientific publications. He created a new multidimensional multidisciplinary scientific branch - psychoneurology. He also proposed "biopsychosocial" model in the interpretation of human diseases [2].

Both Ivan Pavlov and Bekhterev independently developed a theory of conditioned reflexes which describe automatic responses to the environment. What was called association reflex by Bekhterev is called the conditioned reflex by Pavlov, although the two theories are essentially the same [3].

Vladimir Bekhterev (source: wikipedia)

Bekhterev's pupil Ludwig Puusepp (1875-1942) became the first full-time Russian neurosurgeon ("surgical neurologist"). He headed the first university course in surgical neurology in the world organised in 1909 at Bekhterev's Psychoneurological Institutte in St. Petersburg and became professor of surgical neurology in 1910. The role of neurologist might be illustrated by the development of a sterotactic instrument named "encephalometer" designed by D. Zernov in 1889 and improved by G. Rossolimo in 1907 [1].

Ludwig Puusepp: world's first professor of Neurosurgery ( Source ; Wikipedia)

Sources: 

1.Lichterman BL. Roots and routes of Russian neurosurgery (from surgical neurology towards neurological surgery).J Hist Neurosci. 1998 Aug;7(2):125-35.

2.Akimenko MA.Vladimir Mikhailovich Bekhterev. J Hist Neurosci. 2007 Jan-Jun;16(1-2):100-9

3. Wikipedia