Vladimir Mikhailovich Bekhterev (born January 20, old style, 1857 in the village of Sorali, Vyatka province, now the village of Bekhterevo, Elabuga region of Tatarstan; died December 24, 1927 in Moscow) - a major scientist: doctor, neurologist, psychiatrist, psychologist, physiologist and morphologist.
Born into the family of a police officer, he lost his father early; my mother had difficulty finding funds to study at the gymnasium. Graduated from the Medical-Surgical Academy in St. Petersburg; in the spring and summer of 1877 he took part in military operations in Bulgaria (during the Russian-Turkish War of 1877-1878)
On July 24, 1885, he was appointed extraordinary professor and head of the department of psychiatry at Kazan University. He participated in the establishment of Russia's first district psychiatric hospital in Kazan - he introduced useful and interesting work into the course of treatment, and eliminated any forms of violence against patients.
Head the department subject to the organization of a research laboratory. For its creation, the Ministry of Education allocated 1000 rubles and an annual budget of 300 rubles. This was the first psychophysiological laboratory in Russia.
The subject of study was the structure of the brain and nervous tissue. In 1885, Bekhterev described the most important cellular accumulation that is part of the vestibular system.
In the works of 1887-1892. discovered and described the pathways of the spinal cord and brain, showed the connection between individual areas of the cerebral cortex and certain internal organs and tissues - this work brought him world fame.
Bekhterev was one of the first to apply a scientific approach to raising young children: based on studying the movements of infants, he showed that personality formation begins in the first months of life.
In the fall of 1893, Bekhterev moved to St. Petersburg, where he took up a position Military Medical Academy Department of Mental and Nervous Diseases. He began teaching neuropathology and psychiatry at the academy and the newly opened Women's Medical Institute.
At the Military Medical Academy, he organized one of the world's first neurosurgical departments.
Using public funds, he created the Psychoneurological Institute in 1908, which now bears his name.
During the war, the institute operated on the wounded and provided assistance to people who became mentally ill at the front.
In May 1918, he developed a plan for the creation of the Brain Institute, the leadership of which the Soviet government entrusted to Bekhterev.
Then, in 1918, Bekhterev announced the creation new science- reflexology. In his opinion, an objective study of personality is possible based on the study of reflexes.
Based on the law of conservation of energy, a person’s mental energy cannot disappear without a trace, the founder of reflexology argued, therefore, the so-called “immortality of the soul” should be the subject of scientific research.
Bekhterev was not welcome with such conclusions in the Soviet state. On December 24, 1927, during the First All-Union Congress of Neuropathologists and Psychiatrists, Bekhterev died suddenly and unexpectedly.
According to the official version, he was “poisoned from canned food.” The urn with his ashes is buried at the Volkov cemetery in St. Petersburg, the brain is kept at the Brain Institute.
The contribution of Vladimir Mikhailovich Bekhterev to medicine is enormous. Besides the famous work- studies of the conductive tracts of the brain and spinal cord - Bekhterev made many discoveries in anatomy and morphology.
As a neurologist, Bekhterev described a number of diseases, one of which (ankylosing spondylitis) is now called “Bekhterev’s disease.”
He studied and treated many mental disorders and syndromes: fear of blushing, fear of being late, obsessive jealousy, obsessive smiling, fear of someone else's gaze, fear of sexual impotence, obsession with reptiles (reptilophrenia) and others.
For more than 40 years, Bekhterev studied and used hypnosis for treatment, while developing the theory of suggestion.
In addition to the dissertation “Experience in clinical research of body temperature in some forms of mental illness,” Bekhterev owns numerous works that are devoted to the description of little-studied pathological processes nervous system And individual cases nervous diseases.
(1857-1927) Russian psychiatrist and neurologist
Vladimir Mikhailovich Bekhterev was born in the small Udmurt village of Sorali, Elabuga district, Vyatka province. His father, Mikhail Bekhterev, was a police officer, his mother, Nadezhda Lvovna, came from a merchant family.
Vladimir was the third and most youngest child in family. The first years of his life were spent in constant moving. My father was promoted to Glazov, where the family settled in their own house. Soon the elder Bekhterev received a new promotion and became the head of the department for supervision of political exiles. Vladimir worked with one of them, the Polish journalist K. Tchizhevsky foreign languages, preparing to enter the gymnasium. In 1864, he and his mother came to Vyatka, where they successfully passed the exams and were immediately admitted to the second grade of the gymnasium. But the success was overshadowed by the unexpected conclusion of doctors who discovered consumption in his father. The Bekhterevs had to move again, this time to Vyatka, where their father bought a house, and the family began to settle in a new place. Soon, Vladimir’s father died, but his mother managed to ensure that her children were taught at the gymnasium “at public expense.”
Vladimir becomes one of the best students at the gymnasium; he completes the training program ahead of schedule and receives a matriculation certificate when he is not yet 17 years old. In the summer of 1872 he came to St. Petersburg and became a student at the Medical-Surgical Academy. Based on the results of the entrance exams, he received the right to free education with the only condition: after completing his studies, he had to become a military doctor.
My future profession Vladimir Bekhterev was chosen by chance. In his second year, he suffered a nervous breakdown from overload, and he ended up in an academic clinic, which was headed by one of the largest Russian psychiatrists, Ivan Mikhailovich Balinsky. After recovery, Bekhterev begins to attend Balinsky’s student seminar.
The future physiologist Ivan Petrovich Pavlov studied at the Academy together with Vladimir Bekhterev. After graduation educational institution their friendship was not interrupted until Bekhterev’s death, although the relationship between them was more like rivalry.
In 1877, the Russian-Turkish War began, and, despite the fact that senior students were not subject to conscription, Bekhterev obtained permission to go to the front. He worked as a doctor as part of a medical team organized with funds from the entrepreneurs Ryzhov brothers, and participated in all major battles. The day after the capture of Plevna, Vladimir Bekhterev fell ill with malaria, and after a stay in the evacuation hospital he was sent for treatment to St. Petersburg.
After leaving the hospital, Vladimir Bekhterev learned that, as a participant in hostilities, he could continue his studies for free and without a reduction in time. However, he did not take advantage of the privilege he received and passed all the exams ahead of schedule along with his fellow students who did not interrupt their studies. In 1878, Bekhterev brilliantly defended his thesis on the treatment of rare forms of tuberculosis. The Academic Council recommended it for publication and awarded the author a personal prize.
Vladimir Mikhailovich Bekhterev was unable to exercise the right to defend his doctoral dissertation without first passing exams, since he needed to continue his military service. Taking into account the scientific merits of the young doctor, the leadership of the Academy was able to agree on his continuation of service as an intern in the academic clinic for mental and nervous diseases. Bekhterev became one of Balinsky's students. In parallel with his work at the clinic, he taught at the Academy.
In 1878 he married his fellow countrywoman N. Bazilevskaya. Soon the couple has a son, Evgeniy, followed by a daughter, Olga. A week after her birth, Vladimir Bekhterev brilliantly defended his dissertation and received the degree of Doctor of Medicine and the title of privat-docent. His dissertation focused on establishing links between mental disorders and clinical symptoms. He formed signs by which it was possible to establish the presence of a particular mental illness.
In addition to being awarded a doctorate, Bekhterev was given the right to travel abroad. He went to Germany, where he wanted to undergo an internship with the largest German neurologists Westphal and Mendel. Arriving in Berlin, Vladimir Bekhterev learned that the German government limited the length of stay of foreigners in the capital to six weeks. Then he moved to Leipzig, where he began working at the clinic of P. Flexig. Under the guidance of a scientist, Bekhterev for the first time turns to the study of the physiology of nervous processes. He published several articles in German journals, where he laid the foundations of a new science called neurophysiology.
Flexig highly appreciated the work of the Russian scientist and invited Bekhterev to continue his internship in Paris with the famous scientist Jean Martin Charcot. However, having arrived in Paris, Vladimir Mikhailovich Bekhterev received a letter from the Minister of Public Education A. Delyanov, who invited the scientist to take the position of professor and head of the department of mental illness at Kazan University. By that time he was one of the largest scientists in Europe.
Vladimir Bekhterev agrees and, after spending only a few weeks in Paris in the summer of 1885, he returns to Russia. In Kazan, he becomes the head of one of the largest psychoneurological centers in the country, and thanks to funds allocated by the authorities, he opens a laboratory and clinic. Gradually Bekhterev creates an equipped last word a neurophysiological laboratory that develops unique methods for treating mental illnesses.
A talented scientist studies the structure of the brain, and summarizes his observations in the book “Conducting Pathways of the Brain” (1892), which was immediately translated into basic European languages. On his initiative, the Department of Neuropathology was established in Kazan, headed by Bekhterev’s student Professor L. Darkshevich.
However, the scientist’s family life is not as successful as his scientific career. Soon after moving to Kazan, his eldest son dies of tuberculosis. But after some time, a son and daughter are born to him.
In 1893, Vladimir Mikhailovich Bekhterev received an invitation from the head of the St. Petersburg Military Medical Academy to head the department of mental and nervous diseases. Having moved to St. Petersburg, the scientist focuses on studying the physiology of the brain. In the clinic he led, he organized the country's first neurosurgical department. A team of promising young researchers gathers around the scientist, a unique scientific community arises in which surgeons work side by side with psychiatrists. For the first time in the world, Bekhterev demonstrates cases of surgical treatment of mental illnesses. In addition, he organizes a number of specialized laboratories at the clinic in which research is conducted on the anatomy and physiology of the brain, and experimental psychology. On the initiative of the scientist, special medical workshops are organized in which patients work. He proved that work can be the most important means for treating mental disorders.
In 1895, the scientist published the second edition of the book “The Conducting Pathways of the Brain,” for which he was nominated for the K. Baer Prize, the highest award in science. natural sciences Russian Academy Sci. Bekhterev addresses the Academy with a letter in which he agrees to accept the prize only if it is shared with I. Pavlov, whose work was also nominated. The Presidium of the Academy decides to combine the first and second prizes and award scientists a special award in the amount of 700 rubles.
In parallel with recognition in Russia, Bekhterev’s international fame is also growing. He becomes a member of a number of major scientific societies and European academies of sciences. On May 15, 1899, he was awarded the title of academician of the Military Medical Academy.
IN late XIX V. The clinic led by the scientist becomes the largest center for training neurologists and psychiatrists in both Russia and Europe. It employs interns from different countries the world and from all corners of the country. The clinic publishes several scientific journals and annual issues of scientific reports.
Vladimir Bekhterev's ability to work was truly amazing. He published about twenty annually scientific works, taught, performed daily rounds, and conducted weekly outpatient visits. Under his leadership, unique methods for diagnosing brain diseases were developed. It is curious that back in 1907, the doctor G. Vikhrev, who worked at the Bekhterev clinic, built the world's first X-ray scope - a device that made it possible to obtain stereoscopic X-ray images. Bekhterev appreciated the discovery and predicted a great future for it, but at that time the level of development of science did not allow the creation of a full-fledged apparatus. Only many years later would it be built in the USA and called a tomograph.
With the beginning Russo-Japanese War, Vladimir Mikhailovich Bekhterev directs his students to Far East for neurosurgical care of the wounded.
In 1905, the head of the Military Medical Academy suddenly died, and the Academic Council unanimously voted for the appointment of Bekhterev to this post. Already in the first months of his new position, he decides to reinstate all students at the Academy who were previously expelled for participating in revolutionary actions. Fearing unrest, the authorities did not dare to cancel Bekhterev's order, but in January 1906 the Minister of War nevertheless removed him from his post, citing the fact that administrative activities distracted the scientist from scientific research.
Bekhterev plunges headlong into scientific work, releasing his fundamental work “Fundamentals of the Study of Brain Functions.” In this work, he establishes the correspondence of the system of conditioned reflexes with the work of various parts of the brain, and develops a method for complex diagnostics of the brain, with the help of which doctors of subsequent generations successfully treated patients. The work was nominated for the Baer Prize, but Bekhterev did not receive it due to a negative review from I. Pavlov, who did not accept his colleague’s concept, considering it too revolutionary.
Vladimir Bekhterev usually spent his free time at his dacha in the town of Kuokkala. There he met the famous Russian artist Ilya Repin, who painted a portrait of the scientist.
After the end of the war with Japan, Bekhterev was able to achieve the implementation of his long-standing plan - to organize a Psychoneurological Institute. Over time, it became both an educational and research institution. Bekhterev assembled a team consisting of the largest Russian scientists. Physiologist Nikolai Vvedensky, historian Evgeniy Tarle, chemist D. Tsvet, biologists G. Wagner and M. Kovalevsky gave lectures at the institute.
When in 1911 some teachers left state universities in protest against the policies of the then Minister of Public Education Lev Kasso, many of them began to work for Bekhterev. The authorities did not like this development of events, and at the first opportunity, which presented itself in 1913, when Vladimir Mikhailovich Bekhterev turned 56 years old, he was asked to submit his resignation letter from military service, which meant leaving the Academy. At the same time, he was forced to stop working at the Women's Medical Institute, they tried to fire him from the Psychoneurological Institute, but Casso's order caused a unanimous protest from the entire team, and the authorities did not insist on implementing the decision.
Bekhterev remained at the head of the institute until 1918, when, by decision of the Soviet government, the institution was renamed the Brain Institute.
After leaving the academy, the scientist published a two-volume work, “General Diagnosis of Diseases of the Nervous System,” where he summarized his vast experience. For many years this work was reference book neurologists and psychiatrists.
After the Bolsheviks came to power, Vladimir Bekhterev worked on the scientific councils of the People's Commissariat for Education and the People's Commissariat of Health. The Bekhterev Institute opened courses for training military paramedics for the Red Army.
The scientist continued to publish scientific works. In 1918, he published the book “General Fundamentals of Reflexology,” in which he applied Pavlov’s observations to humans. Soon Bekhterev becomes president of the Psychoneurological Academy.
In the spring of 1923, he went on a business trip abroad, and on the way he stopped in Moscow, where he consulted Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, who had recently suffered a massive stroke, causing loss of speech and paralysis.
In 1925, the 40th anniversary was celebrated in Moscow and Leningrad scientific activity Bekhterev. Soon after the anniversary, he loses his wife - she dies of pneumonia. To support him, Bekhterev’s older brother Nikolai moves in with him. Trying to rebuild my family life, a famous scientist marries one of his employees.
In December 1927, he arrived in Moscow, where a congress of neuropathologists and psychiatrists was opening. On the morning of December 24, the scientist was unexpectedly summoned to the Kremlin for consultation. Only many years later it became known that on this day he examined Joseph Stalin and gave him a merciless but correct diagnosis - paranoid schizophrenia. In the evening, Vladimir Bekhterev arrived at a banquet on the occasion of the opening of the congress, and the next day he suddenly died from acute intestinal poisoning. Although the doctors insisted on an autopsy, the scientist’s body was urgently cremated and sent to Leningrad. The urn with the ashes was installed in the museum at the institute, created back in 1925. Only many years later she was buried in the Volkov cemetery.
The work of Vladimir Mikhailovich Bekhterev was continued by his descendants. The daughter of his son Peter, Natalya Petrovna Bekhtereva, became a neurologist and for the development of new treatment methods she was elected a member of the USSR Academy of Sciences.
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Preface
“...Only two people know – the Lord God and Bekhterev”
They were surprised at him. Academician Bekhterev’s student, Professor Mikhail Pavlovich Nikitin, recalled his conversation with one of the foreign scientists, who unexpectedly admitted: “I would believe that Vladimir Bekhterev alone did so much in science and wrote so many scientific papers, if I were sure that they could be read in one life." Various bibliographic reference books indicate that Vladimir Bekhterev wrote and published more than a thousand scientific works.
They believed in him. Recommending the young scientist Bekhterev to head the department of psychiatry at Kazan University, his teacher I.M. Balinsky wrote that “he stood firmly on anatomical and physiological soil - the only one from which further successes in the science of nervous and mental illnesses should be expected.”
Legends were made about him. One of the most famous even received the name “Bekhterev on the rounds.” “Bekhterev walked around the wards, accompanied by his “tail,” joked, smiling, somehow freely today resolving issues that baffled others.
– This patient became deaf after a quarrel. Otolaryngologists do not find any changes in the hearing aid. They believed that the deafness was hysterical, but... - Raisa Yakovlevna Golant reported to Bekhterev, busily raising her sharp chin.
- Hm! – he clapped his hands just above the patient’s ear: no reaction. “However...” He motioned for the patient to undress to the waist. I wrote on a piece of paper: “I will run my finger or piece of paper along your back, and you will answer me - with what?” And then, running his finger, he simultaneously rustled the piece of paper.
“A piece of paper,” the patient said quickly.
– You are healthy, you can already hear! You can be discharged.
“Thank you,” the patient agreed quietly. Bekhterev told the doctors accompanying him:
– Simulation vulgaris.
“...This patient was transferred to us from Maximilianovskaya,” Golant continued. – Right-sided paralysis. The patient suffers from heart disease. Vascular embolism was suspected. Treatment for two months did not produce any improvement. So we decided to consult with you...
Bekhterev carefully examined the patient and, putting the tube to the skull, began to listen to him. He called everyone in turn:
- Do you hear? This is what is called “spinning top noise.” I'm guessing an aneurysm. It puts pressure on the motor area of the left hemisphere. The patient must be operated on immediately.
The round continued.
– Aphasia... An engineer by profession, he came to us with a complete loss of speech. However, it can be explained in writing or using a special dictionary. Hearing is not impaired.
Bekhterev paused and cleared his throat. Finally he leaned over to the patient and took hold of the button of his robe:
- Tell me, dear... what is two plus two?
The patient became embarrassed, shrugged his shoulders in bewilderment, and wrinkled his forehead pitifully. Bekhterev sighed:
“Apparently, the anterior part of Broca’s center, anatomically connected to the counting center, is affected...” and, moving away from the patient, he said: “Symptomatic treatment.” Bromides. Physiotherapy. Peace! – and spread his hands, emphasizing the powerlessness of medicine.
And Bekhterev himself approached this frail, nimble old woman who stood up, smiling, as the academician entered the ward:
- Well, grandma, is it better?
- Better, falcon, better.
- Here you go. Wonderful. Go to your old man. And all will be well. I’ll come to your golden wedding.”
They were sincerely admired. Bekhterev's colleagues seriously said that only two people know the anatomy of the brain - the Lord God and Bekhterev.
The stages of his “big journey” were amazing. Vladimir Bekhterev was a genius. He was the first in the world to create a new scientific field - psychoneurology and devoted his entire life to the study of human personality. It was for this purpose that he founded 33 institutes and 29 scientific journals. More than 5,000 students attended Bekhterev's school. Starting with the study of the physiology of the brain, he moved on to studying its work in various modes and their reflection on physiology.
He seriously studied hypnosis, and even introduced its medical practice in Russia.
First to formulate laws social psychology, developed issues of personality development.
With his titanic work, he proved: one person can do a lot if he goes towards a big goal. And on the way to the goal he acquires a lot of titles and knowledge. Bekhterev is a professor, academician, psychiatrist, neuropathologist, psychologist, physiologist, morphologist, hypnotist and philosopher.
The genius was born on February 1, 1857 in the village of Sorali, Vyatka province, in the family of a police officer. At the age of nine, he was left without a father, and a family of five - a mother and four sons - experienced great financial difficulties.
In 1878 he graduated from the Medical-Surgical Academy. Since 1885, he was the head of the department of psychiatry at Kazan University, where he first created a psychophysiological laboratory and founded the journal “Neurological Bulletin” and the Kazan Society of Neuropathologists and Psychiatrists.
From 1893 he worked in St. Petersburg, holding the post of professor at the Military Medical Academy. Since 1897 - professor of Women's medical institute.
In 1908, he became director of the Psychoneurological Institute he founded.
In 1918, he headed the Institute for the Study of the Brain and Mental Activity, created on his initiative (later - the State Reflexological Institute for the Study of the Brain, which received his name).
In 1927 he was awarded the title of Honored Scientist of the RSFSR.
As a scientist, he was always interested in people - their psyche and brain. According to experts, he studied personality based on a comprehensive study of the brain using physiological, anatomical and psychological methods, later - through an attempt to create a comprehensive science about man and society (referred to as reflexology).
Bekhterev's work in the field of brain morphology became the largest contribution to science.
He devoted almost 20 years to studying sex education and early child behavior.
All his life he studied the power of hypnotic suggestion, including in alcoholism. Developed the theory of suggestion.
He was the first to identify a number of characteristic reflexes, symptoms and syndromes important for the diagnosis of neuropsychiatric diseases. Described a number of diseases and methods of their treatment. In addition to the dissertation “Experience in clinical research of body temperature in some forms of mental illness,” Bekhterev owns numerous works that are devoted to the description of little-studied pathological processes of the nervous system and individual cases of nervous diseases. For example, he studied and treated many mental disorders and syndromes: fear of blushing, fear of being late, obsessive jealousy, obsessive smiling, fear of someone else's gaze, fear of sexual impotence, obsession with reptiles (reptilophrenia) and others.
Assessing the importance of psychology for solving the fundamental problems of psychiatry, Bekhterev did not forget that psychiatry as a clinical discipline, in turn, enriches psychology, poses new problems for it and solves some complex issues of psychology. Bekhterev understood this mutual enrichment of psychology and psychiatry as follows: “...having received an impetus in its development, psychiatry as a science dealing with painful disorders of mental activity, has provided enormous services to psychology. The latest advances in psychiatry, due largely to the clinical study of mental disorders at the patient's bedside, served as the basis for a special branch of knowledge known as pathological psychology, which has already led to the resolution of many psychological problems and from which, no doubt, even more in this regard can be expected in the future.”
BEKHTEREV Vladimir Mikhailovich(1857-1927) - Russian physiologist, neurologist, psychiatrist, psychologist. He founded the first experimental psychological laboratory in Russia (1885), and then the Psychoneurological Institute (1908) - the world's first center for the comprehensive study of man. Based on the reflex concept of mental activity put forward by Ivan Mikhailovich Sechenov, he developed a natural science theory of behavior. Arose in opposition to traditional introspective psychology of consciousness, the theory of V.M. Bekhterev initially received the name objective psychology (1904), then psychoreflexology (1910) and, finally, reflexology (1917). V.M. Bekhterev made a major contribution to the development of domestic experimental psychology (“General Fundamentals of Human Reflexology”, 1917).
Vladimir Mikhailovich Bekhterev, famous Russian neurologist, neuropathologist, psychologist, psychiatrist, morphologist and physiologist of the nervous system, was born on January 20, 1857. in the village of Sorali, Elabuga district, Vyatka province, in the family of a minor civil servant. In August 1867 he began classes at the Vyatka gymnasium, and since Bekhterev decided in his youth to devote his life to neuropathology and psychiatry, after graduating from seven classes of the gymnasium in 1873. he entered the Medical-Surgical Academy.
In 1878 He graduated from the Medical-Surgical Academy in St. Petersburg and was retained for further studies at the Department of Psychiatry under I. P. Merzheevsky. In 1879 Bekhterev was accepted as a full member of the St. Petersburg Society of Psychiatrists.
April 4, 1881 Bekhterev successfully defended his doctoral dissertation in medicine on the topic “Experience in clinical research of body temperature in some forms of mental illness” and received the academic title of privat-docent. In 1884 Bekhterev went on a business trip abroad, where he studied with such famous European psychologists as Dubois-Reymond, Wundt, Fleksig and Charcot.
After returning from a business trip, Bekhterev began giving a course of lectures on the diagnosis of nervous diseases to fifth-year students at Kazan University. Having been since 1884 a professor at the Kazan University in the Department of Mental Diseases, Bekhterev ensured the teaching of this subject by setting up a clinical department in the Kazan district hospital and a psychophysiological laboratory at the university; founded the Society of Neuropathologists and Psychiatrists, founded the journal “Neurological Bulletin” and published a number of his works, as well as the works of his students in various departments of neuropathology and anatomy of the nervous system.
In 1883 Bekhterev was awarded a silver medal by the Society of Russian Doctors for his article “On forced and violent movements during the destruction of certain parts of the central nervous system.” In this article, Bekhterev drew attention to the fact that nervous diseases can often be accompanied by mental disorders, and with mental illness there may also be signs of organic damage to the central nervous system. In the same year he was elected a member of the Italian Society of Psychiatrists.
His most famous article, “Stiffness of the spine with its curvature as a special form of the disease,” was published in the capital’s magazine “Doctor” in 1892. Bekhterev described “stiffness of the spine with its curvature as a special form of the disease” (now better known as ankylosing spondylitis, ankylosing spondylitis, rheumatoid spondylitis), that is, a systemic inflammatory disease connective tissue with damage to the articular-ligamentous apparatus of the spine, as well as peripheral joints, sacroiliac joints, hip and shoulder joints and involvement in the process internal organs. Bekhterev also identified diseases such as choreic epilepsy, syphilitic multiple sclerosis, and acute cerebellar ataxia of alcoholics. These, as well as other neurological symptoms first identified by the scientist and a number of original clinical observations were reflected in the two-volume book “Nervous Diseases in Individual Observations”, published in Kazan.
Since 1893 The Kazan Neurological Society began to regularly publish its printed organ - the journal “Neurological Bulletin”, which was published until 1918. edited by Vladimir Mikhailovich Bekhterev. In the spring of 1893 Bekhterev received an invitation from the head of the St. Petersburg Military Medical Academy to occupy the department of mental and nervous diseases. Bekhterev arrived in St. Petersburg and began to create the first neurosurgical operating room in Russia.
In the laboratories of the clinic, Bekhterev, together with his employees and students, continued numerous studies on the morphology and physiology of the nervous system. This allowed him to replenish materials on neuromorphology and begin work on the fundamental seven-volume work “Fundamentals of the Study of Brain Functions.”
In 1894 Bekhterev was appointed a member of the medical council of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and in 1895. he became a member of the Military Medical Academic Council under the Minister of War and at the same time a member of the board of a nursing home for the mentally ill.
In November 1900 The two-volume book “Conducting Pathways of the Spinal Cord and Brain” was nominated by the Russian Academy of Sciences for the Academician K. M. Baer Prize. In 1902 He published the book “Psyche and Life”. By that time, Bekhterev had prepared for publication the first volume of the work “Fundamentals of the Study of Brain Functions,” which became his main work on neurophysiology. Here were collected and systematized general provisions about brain activity. Thus, Bekhterev presented the energy theory of inhibition, according to which nervous energy in the brain rushes to the center in an active state. According to Bekhterev, this energy seems to flock to him along the pathways connecting individual territories of the brain, primarily from nearby brain territories, in which, as Bekhterev believed, “a decrease in excitability, and therefore depression,” occurs.
In general, Bekhterev’s work on the study of brain morphology made an invaluable contribution to the development domestic psychology He, in particular, was interested in the course of individual bundles in the central nervous system, the composition of the white matter of the spinal cord and the course of fibers in the gray matter, and at the same time, on the basis of his experiments, he was able to clarify the physiological significance of individual parts of the central nervous system (visual thalamus, vestibular branch auditory nerve, inferior and superior olives, quadrigeminal).
Working directly on the functions of the brain, Bekhterev discovered the nuclei and pathways in the brain; created the doctrine of the spinal cord pathways and functional anatomy of the brain; established the anatomical and physiological basis of balance and spatial orientation, discovered centers of movement and secretion of internal organs in the cerebral cortex, etc.
After completing work on seven volumes of “Fundamentals of the Study of Brain Functions” Special attention Bekhterev began to be attracted to problems of psychology. Bekhterev spoke about the equal existence of two psychologies: he distinguished subjective psychology, the main method of which should be introspection, and objective psychology. Bekhterev called himself a representative of objective psychology, but he considered it possible to objectively study only what is externally observable, i.e. behavior (in the behaviorist sense), and physiological activity of the nervous system.
Based on the fact that mental activity arises as a result of the work of the brain, he considered it possible to rely mainly on the achievements of physiology, and above all on the doctrine of conditioned reflexes. Thus, Bekhterev creates a whole doctrine, which he called reflexology, which actually continued the work of Bekhterev’s objective psychology.
In 1907-1910, Bekhterev published three volumes of the book “Objective Psychology”. The scientist claimed that everything mental processes accompanied by reflex motor and autonomic reactions that are accessible to observation and registration.
To describe complex forms of reflex activity, Bekhterev proposed the term “combination-motor reflex.” He also described a number of physiological and pathological reflexes, symptoms and syndromes. The physiological reflexes discovered by Bekhterev (scapulohumeral, large spindle reflex, expiratory, etc.) make it possible to determine the state of the corresponding reflex arcs, and pathological ones (Mendel-Bekhterev dorsalfoot reflex, carpal-digital reflex, Bekhterev-Jacobson reflex) reflect damage to the pyramidal tracts. Bekhterev's symptoms are observed in various pathological conditions: tabes dorsalis, sciatic neuralgia, massive cerebral strokes, angiotrophoneurosis, pathological processes in the membranes of the base of the brain, etc.
To assess symptoms, Bekhterev created special devices (algesimeter, which allows you to accurately measure pain sensitivity; baresthesiometer, which measures sensitivity to pressure; myoesthesiometer - a device for measuring sensitivity, etc.).
Bekhterev also developed objective methods for studying the neuropsychic development of children, the connection between nervous and mental illnesses, psychopathy and circular psychosis, the clinic and pathogenesis of hallucinations, described a number of forms of obsessive states, various manifestations of mental automatism. For the treatment of neuropsychic diseases, he introduced combination-reflex therapy for neuroses and alcoholism, psychotherapy using the method of distraction, collective psychotherapy. Ankylosing spondylitis was widely used as a sedative.
In 1908 Bekhterev created the Psychoneurological Institute in St. Petersburg and became its director. After the revolution in 1918 Bekhterev appealed to the Council of People's Commissars with a petition to organize an Institute for the Study of the Brain and Mental Activity. When the institute was created, Bekhterev took the position of its director and remained so until his death. The Institute for the Study of the Brain and Mental Activity was subsequently named the State Reflexological Institute for the Study of the Brain named after. V. M. Bekhtereva.
In 1921 Academician V.M. Bekhterev, together with the famous animal trainer V.L. Durov, conducted experiments in mentally instilling pre-planned actions in trained dogs. Similar experiments were carried out in the practical laboratory of zoopsychology, which was led by V.L. Durov with the participation of one of the pioneers of mental suggestion in the USSR, engineer B.B. Kazhinsky.
Already by the beginning of 1921. in the laboratory of V.L. Over the course of 20 months of research, Durov conducted 1,278 experiments with mental suggestion (on dogs), including 696 successful and 582 unsuccessful. Experiments with dogs showed that mental suggestion does not necessarily have to be carried out by a trainer, it could be an experienced inducer. It was only necessary that he knew and applied the transfer method established by the trainer. Suggestion was carried out both with direct visual contact with the animal and at a distance, when the dogs did not see or hear the trainer, and he did not hear them. It should be emphasized that the experiments were carried out with dogs that had certain changes in the psyche that arose after special training.
In 1927, Bekhterev was awarded the title of Honored Scientist of the RSFSR. The great scientist died on December 24, 1927.
In 2007, the 150th anniversary of the birth of V.M. Bekhterev - encyclopedist scientist: neuropathologist, psychiatrist, morphologist, physiologist, psychologist, founder of the national school of psychoneurologists.
Bekhterev Vladimir Mikhailovich was born on January 20 (February 1, new style) 1857, in the village of Sarali, Elabuga district, Vyatka province - now the village of Bekhterevo in the Republic of Tatarstan.
Bekhterev's father, Mikhail Pavlovich, was a police officer; mother, Maria Mikhailovna, daughter of a titular councilor, was educated at a boarding school, where they taught both music and French. In addition to Vladimir, there were two more sons in the family: Nikolai and Alexander, 6 and 3 years older than him. In 1864 the family moved to Vyatka, and a year later the head of the family died of consumption. The family's financial situation was very difficult, nevertheless the brothers received higher education.
In 1873, at the age of 16.5 years, V.M. Bekhterev entered the Medical-Surgical Academy in St. Petersburg. Soon after admission, he suffered a mental disorder - “severe neurasthenia” (diagnosed by V.M. Bekhterev himself) - possibly caused by the new living conditions of a provincial youth in the capital, but 28 days of treatment in the clinic for mental and nervous diseases of the academy restored his health. Perhaps that is why, as a 4th year student, he chose the specialty “nervous and mental illnesses,” but in his autobiography he himself explained the choice by saying that it gave him the opportunity to be closer to public life. As a final year student, Bekhterev took part in the Russian-Turkish War of 1877–1878. as part of the “flying sanitary detachment of the Ryzhov brothers.” One of the brothers was a student at the Medical-Surgical Academy. The squad of 12 people included 7 medical students from the Moscow Art Academy. Under the pseudonym "Orphan" Bekhterev wrote notes for the newspaper "Severny Vestnik". In 1878, Bekhterev passed his final exams ahead of schedule and very successfully and was left for further improvement at the Professorial Institute at the Academy.
On September 9, 1879, Bekhterev married Natalya Petrovna Bazilevskaya, whom he had known from the gymnasium bench back in Vyatka. They had six children: Eugene, born in 1880, soon died, Olga was born in 1883, Vladimir in 1887, Peter in 1888, Ekaterina in 1890, beloved daughter Maria in 1904 .
In 1881, Bekhterev defended his dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Medicine on the topic: “Experience in clinical research of body temperature in some forms of mental illness,” and on November 20 of the same year he received the academic title of privat-docent. In 1883, the Italian Society of Psychiatrists elected V.M. Bekhterev became a full member, and the Society of Russian Doctors awarded him a silver medal for his study “On forced and violent movements during the destruction of certain parts of the central nervous system.”
As a candidate for an internship, V.M. Bekhterev presented 58 works on various issues to the competition commission experimental research and clinics for nervous and mental illnesses, and on June 1, 1984, by decision of the Academy Conference, he was sent on his first scientific trip abroad to Germany. V.M. Bekhterev attended lectures by Westphal, Mendel, Dubois-Raymond and other famous German scientists who studied the nervous system. Then in Leipzig he worked with the leading neurologist and morphologist of that time, P. Flexig, to whom he soon dedicated his first fundamental monograph, “The Conducting Paths of the Spinal Cord and Brain.” Here he began to study psychology in the laboratory of the famous W. Wund. In December 1884 V.M. Bekhterev received an official invitation from the Minister of Public Education Delyanov to occupy the department of psychiatry at Kazan University. He accepted this invitation with certain conditions, one of which included completing a full scientific mission program. After Leipzig, Bekhterev visited Paris, where he became acquainted with the work of the great J. Charcot, and then Munich (prof. Gudden’s clinic) and completed his business trip in the summer of 1885 in Vienna at the clinic of prof. Meynert.
In the fall of 1885 V.M. Bekhterev began working at Kazan University. He reorganized the Department of Psychiatry, at which he soon organized the first psychophysiological laboratory in Russia, where V.M. Bekhterev began to study the morphology of the nervous system. During the Kazan period of V.M.’s life. Bekhterev enriched science with discoveries in the field of anatomy and physiology of various structures of the brain and spinal cord. These studies were summarized in the first monograph, “The Conducting Pathways of the Spinal Cord and Brain” (1893); three years later, in 1896, a second, thoroughly revised edition was published, three times larger in volume and supplemented by 302 drawings made from brain preparations. This is an enormously valuable collection of empirical material obtained both by the author himself and by other researchers. German professor F. Kopsch (1868–1955) argued that “only two people know the anatomy of the brain perfectly - God and Bekhterev.” In 1892 V.M. Bekhterev was the initiator of the creation of the Kazan Neurological Society, and in 1893 he created the journal “Neurological Bulletin”, of which he was the editor for many subsequent years.
September 26, 1893 V.M. Bekhterev, instead of his teacher I.P., who retired due to length of service. Merzheevsky (1838–1908), headed the department of mental and nervous diseases of the Military Medical Academy and became director of the clinic of mental illnesses of the Clinical Military Hospital, on the basis of which the department was located. Here, research continued that began in Kazan and ended with the publication in 1903–1907 of the monograph “Fundamentals of the Study of Brain Functions,” in 7 parts. This 2,500-page work contains an analysis of the functions of various parts of the nervous system. In 1909 the work was transferred to German. During his service in the Military Medical Academy (1893–1913), the family of V.M. Bekhtereva occupied a government-owned apartment at the psychiatric clinic of the Military Medical Academy (Botkinskaya St., 9).
In St. Petersburg in 1896 V.M. Bekhterev created the journal “Review of Psychiatry, Neurology and Experimental Psychology”, and in 1897 a newly built clinic for nervous diseases of the Military Medical Academy (Lesnoy Ave., 2) was opened, in which a special operating room was organized for the surgical treatment of certain nervous and mental disorders. diseases.
In 1899 V.M. Bekhterev was elected academician of the Military Medical Academy and awarded the gold medal of the Russian Academy of Sciences. A year later (in 1900) for the monograph “Conducting Pathways of the Spinal Cord and Brain” V.M. Bekhterev was awarded the Baer Prize of the Russian Academy of Sciences. In the same year, he was elected chairman of the Russian Society of Normal and Pathological Psychology and professor of the Women's Medical Institute in the department of nervous and mental illnesses.
During the winter of 1905/1906 V.M. Bekhterev served as head of the Military Medical Academy. In his autobiography, he wrote about this time: “I was required to lead the academy, as an institution of the military department, “safely” through the storm and stress of the revolution. I can say that this was done with honor, but it would be unnecessary to convey here the details of all the incidents that happened at the academy during this time.” The Minister of War invited V.M. Bekhterev to take this post “finally..., retaining my department and directorship of the clinic,” but V.M. Bekhterev refused: during these years his scientific interests were aimed at studying psychology - in 1903 he first proposed the creation of a Psychoneurological Institute. These plans were successfully realized in 1907. In the same year V.M. Bekhterev received the title of Honored Ordinary Professor.
Over the next four years, filled with efforts to create the institute, V.M. Bekhterev completed the three-volume monograph “Objective Psychology”. In 1911, the Institute’s first own buildings appeared in the so-called Tsar’s Town behind the Nevskaya Zastava, built by a famous construction specialist medical institutions court architect R. F. Meltzer (1860–1943). In the same 1911 V.M. Bekhterev published a monograph “Hypnosis, suggestion and hypnotherapy and their therapeutic value.”
In 1912, an Experimental Clinical Institute for the Study of Alcoholism was opened within the structure of the Psychoneurological Institute. A year later, the international scientific community decided to transform it into an international science Center. On January 19, 1913, the Council of the Psychoneurological Institute unanimously elected V.M. Bekhterev as President of the Institute for the next five years; On January 24, the relevant documents were sent for approval to the Ministry of Public Education.
In September-October V.M. Bekhterev took part in the Beilis Case, which was widely discussed in Russia: he conducted a second psychiatric examination and proved the innocence of Mendel Beilis (he was charged with the ritual murder of the Orthodox 13-year-old boy Andrei Yushchinsky, and according to the results of the first examination conducted by Professor I.A. Sikorsky, this possibility was not excluded). After the speech by V.M. Bekhterev's trial M. Beilis was acquitted by the jury. The examination of the Beilis case went down in the history of science as the first forensic psychological and psychiatric examination.
Immediately after V.M.’s speech. Bekhterev on the “Beilis Case”, on October 5, the answer came from the Minister of Public Education L.A. Casso (1865–1914) on the presentation of the Psychoneurological Institute: he did not find it “possible to approve Academician Privy Councilor Bekhterev for the new five-year period with the rank of President of the Institute.” At the same time V.M. Bekhterev was dismissed from the Military Medical Academy and from the Women's Medical Institute.
In 1913, the Bekhterev family settled in their own house, built according to the design of the architect R.F. Meltzer on Kamenny Island. In those days, on the plot of the mansion there were auxiliary buildings: a stable, a garage for the scientist’s car, etc. (only the main building has survived). In addition, the family had a dacha “Quiet Coast” on the shore of the Gulf of Finland (the area of the current village of Smolyachkovo), where they spent Sundays, holidays and all summer. Not far from Bekhterev’s dacha, about thirty versts, there was “Penates” - the estate of the Russian artist I.E. Repin (1844–1930), who was often visited by Bekhterev. According to the recollections of the scientist’s daughter Maria, they went to Repin along the bay on horseback across the shifting sands twice a summer, and always on Ilya’s Day. In the summer of 1913 I.E. Repin painted the famous portrait of V.M. Bekhterev, stored in the Russian Museum, and its author's copy is in the memorial museum of V.M. Bekhterev at the Psychoneurological Institute. The same museum also houses the work of sculptor E.A. Flea - bust of a scientist. While posing V.M. Bekhterev himself sculpted the head of a suffering boy from a piece of clay, and the sculptor Bloch added this work of the scientist to his bust of Bekhterev. The meaning of the amazing composition can be expressed as follows: the suffering of the patient is the essence of Bekhterev the doctor.
During the First World War, V.M. Bekhterev contributed to the re-equipment of the Psychoneurological Institute into a Military Hospital, which housed a first-class neurosurgical department, which was later transformed into the first Neurosurgical Institute in Russia. In 1916, the educational units at the Psychoneurological Institute were transformed into the Private Petrograd University.
Revolution of 1917 V.M. Bekhterev accepted and from December 1917 began working in the scientific and medical department of the People's Commissariat for Education. Since 1918, he was already a member of the Academic Council under the People's Commissariat for Education, and in the same year he managed to organize the Institute for the Study of the Brain and Mental Activity (Brain Institute), for which the government allocated the building of the palace of Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich Jr. (Petrovskaya embankment, 2 ). The Institute has begun research in full swing within the framework of the new scientific direction, named V.M. Bekhterev reflexology. In the same year, his monograph “General Fundamentals of Reflexology” was published.
In 1918, the Private Petrograd University at the Psychoneurological Institute received the official status of the Second Petrograd University. But in 1919 a reorganization took place in Petrograd high school, as a result of which the law and pedagogical faculties were transferred to the First Petrograd University, Faculty of Medicine was converted into State Institute Medical Knowledge (GIMZ), chemical-pharmaceutical department - to the Chemical-Pharmaceutical Institute, veterinary faculty - to the Veterinary-Zootechnical Institute. Thus, the training system created at the university at the Psychoneurological Institute turned out to be so perfect that, if the need arose, individual faculties and even departments were turned into independent higher education institutions without any particular difficulties.
January 1, 1920 V.M. Bekhterev appealed in print to doctors around the world to protest against the food blockade of Russia, which was organized by the Entente countries. This speech in print was broadcast on the same day abroad. The speech of the world famous scientist had a certain impact on the public foreign countries, and after some time a message appeared in the newspapers that the blockade was being lifted.
From 1920 until the end of V.M.’s life. Bekhterev was a deputy of the Petrograd Soviet, accepting Active participation in the work of the permanent commission on public education.
In 1921 V.M. Bekhterev achieved the reorganization of the system of research institutions of the Psychoneurological Institute into the Psychoneurological Academy and was elected its President. In the same year V.M. Bekhterev published the monograph “Collective Reflexology”. During this period, the scientist paid a lot of attention to studying the physiology of labor processes in various professions and issues of scientific organization of labor.
In the memoirs of employees V.M. Bekhterev and his relatives celebrate his distinguishing feature- incredible ability to work. In between lectures, he did not rest, but conducted hypnosis sessions in the next classroom. I was constantly writing something, even on the road. I slept no more than 5–6 hours a day, usually falling asleep at 3 am. After waking up, often without getting up, V.M. Bekhterev began working on the manuscripts. He was modest and undemanding. External living conditions did not play any role for him and his work. Three times a week V.M. Bekhterev conducted visits to patients at home from eight o'clock in the evening and often until late at night (up to 40 patients per evening).
In the summer at V.M.’s dacha Bekhterev slept and worked on the balcony with a huge open window overlooking the bay. There was a small table and a comfortable straw chair in which he sometimes wrote poetry to relax, and over time he accumulated quite a lot of them. Valuing time, he almost never walked. He ate little, mainly vegetarian and dairy foods. For breakfast I preferred steep oatmeal jelly with milk. At lunch he was served a fresh salad separately, without seasoning, with whole leaves. Didn't drink alcohol or smoke at all. I systematically swam in the bay until late autumn.
Brilliant abilities, an inquisitive mind, unwavering perseverance in achieving the goal and the incomparable ability of V.M. Bekhterev were aimed at consistently solving the most difficult problems medical theory and practices for the study, treatment and prevention of neuropsychiatric diseases.
After the revolution, Bekhterev’s wife Natalya Petrovna lived at the “Quiet Coast” dacha, which ended up abroad, in Finland. During the period of post-revolutionary devastation in the life of V.M. Bekhterev another woman appeared - Berta Yakovlevna Gurzhi (nee Are). B.Ya. Gurzhi, an office employee at the Commission for the Improvement of the Living Life of Scientists (KUBU), provided V.M. Bekhterev had his own apartment, located in the city center, to receive patients. After the death of Natalya Petrovna in 1926, Bekhterev formalized his relationship with Berta Yakovlevna, and she began to bear his last name.
In 1927 V.M. Bekhterev received the title of Honored Scientist. On December 24, 1927, during the First All-Union Congress of Neuropathologists and Psychiatrists in Moscow, at which V.M. Bekhterev made a report; he died suddenly. The circumstances of the disease - its development within 24 hours, the unprofessionalism of the treatment - as well as the peculiarities of the pathological autopsy (only the brain was removed and examined), the hasty cremation of the body in Moscow and the subsequent oblivion of the scientist for 30 years - all this suggests a violent nature of death. Berta Yakovlevna, who accompanied Bekhterev to Moscow, was present at his death. In 1937 she was repressed and a month after her arrest she was shot. Urn with the ashes of V.M. Bekhterev, kept for many years in the memorial museum of V.M. Bekhterev, only in 1970 was buried on the Literary Bridge. The author of the tombstone is M.K. Anikushin (1917–1997).
“Systematic index of works and speeches by V.M. Bekhterev, printed in Russian,” compiled by O.B. Kazanskaya and T.Ya. Khvilivitsky in 1954, contains about a thousand titles. These works reflect: the discoveries of V.M. Bekhterev in the morphology and physiology of the nervous system, description of 19 new forms of diseases in psychoneurology, invention of many new methods of diagnosis and treatment, etc. It is known that V.M. Bekhterev conducted approximately a thousand forensic psychiatric examinations. The journal “Bulletin of Knowledge” in 1926 published a list of institutions and journals that arose on the initiative and with the direct participation of Vladimir Mikhailovich: institutions - 33, journals - 10. Subsequently, studies of the scientist’s work made it possible to add another 17 institutions and 2 journals to this list. Work on the bibliography of works by V.M. Ankylosing spondylitis continues, and currently there are 1,350 works published in various journals and individual publications in Russian and about 500 in other languages, mainly in German and French. However, it has not yet been published full meeting essays.
In 1957, for the 100th anniversary of the scientist, the street on which the Psychoneurological Institute is located was named Bekhterev Street, in 1960 a monument was erected to him in front of the main building of the institute (sculptor M.K. Anikushin), a memorial plaque was placed on the building: “Founder Psychoneurological Institute, academician V. M. Bekhterev worked here from 1908 to 1927.” Since 1925, the Psychoneurological Institute bears his name.