The history of the Yeniseysk Hospital began in 1803 — at that time the first district hospital for 10-12 patients was opened. The first permanent doctor was the regimental doctor Paskevich, a russified German. Thanks to his efforts, the first hospital, where soldiers and convicts were treated, was opened in a private house. As there was no money for the maintenance of the institution, the sick froze and were fed only by means of alms.
In 1810 they began with the construction of a 25-bed hospital. It was opened 11 years later, but would admit only those, who were able to pay 48 kopeks per day, as well as an additional amount for medicine. That was a lot of money at that time. The hospital disposed of just one single doctor, who had to worked under hellish conditions. A complaint by the physician V. Popov explained that he just did not have to carry out duties of a doctor, but all tasks of a nurse and manager, as well.
The gold mines with their inhumane working conditions turned people into cripples and ruined their health. Hundreds of workers came to Yeniseysk hoping to get medical help, but the hospital was already crowded with patients. The doctor had to struggle with the public authorities, as, according to current regulations, he was not authorized to otherwise accept more patients yet.
A great deal was done by doctor Krivoshapkin in the 50s and 60s of the 19th century to preserve the health of citizens. According to his opinion the fundamental evil was up to unhygienic conditions in our town. The people used to pour ant throw rubbish into the streets, the puddles turned into stinking lakes. Krivoshapkin managed to convince authorities and townspeople to better dry the garbage, sweep and clean the streets and take the rubbish to a distant place. He also asked about a possible increase of the number of beds in the hospital and – was successful, as well: the started to build a new hospital complex (nowadays this is the territory of the Cossacks gymnasium, the administrative building). Krivoshapkin explored the waters of the Yenisei and discovered a spring of mineral water almost directly in the center; he studied Lake Plotbishchenskoe and recognized its healing properties.
In 1896 they decided to build a new hospital, a polyclinic. Two years later it was ready to admit sick people (in this building we today have the Central Pharmacy).
The first doctor working at this hospital was J. N. Vasilyev, a graduate of Tomsk University, a man of deep democratic beliefs and views. He dedicated his entire short life – he died at the age of 42 – to the inhabitants of Yeniseysk, the preservation of their health. Day and night, in bad weather, when there was mud, rain and snow, he went to the sick who had called for a doctor without taking money. When he died, some impoverished man put his last few kopeks on the table on which the deceased lay and said: "May they use it for a monument". Within a day, hundreds of rubles were collected. Unfortunately, the memorial stone "in honor of the doctor and humanist from grateful citizens of Yeniseysk" no longer exists; it stood there from 1911 to the fifties.
In the September 1922 the following medical institutions were in operation in the district: "1 district hospital with 40 beds, 6 hospitals within the county disposing of 65 beds, 4 medical wards with inpatient admission and 18 beds and 3 contact points for outpatient treatment, a municipal sanatorium, a children's hospital with 35 beds, a Soviet pharmacy...». Admission of the sick was free of charge. Horses were replaced by first-aid vehicles.
By the end of 1932, the district hospital already disposed of 65 beds, and in 1960 the number of permanent doctors and paramedics increased to 339.
In 1930 the municipal hospital employed 8 doctors, in 1936 the number of inpatient departments in operation amounted to 5.
In looking through archival material we were able to find out that in 1944 in the district, in the village of Abalakovo, there were two outbreaks of spotted fever. Immediately, initiating work was carried out in every place. Representatives of the district health authorities drove around in the district, among them the head of the institution A.S. Hessina. At general meetings in the settlements, decisions were made about the opening of bathhouses and delousing facilities for heating clothes and, in accordance with these decisions, it was forbidden to allow people into the house, who had not undergone sufficient sanitary treatment before. It was proposed that all children should have their hair shorn in order to avoid infestation with lice, carriers of diseases.
Hospital collective with senior physician Bashenov at the head (middle).
1940.
In the minutes of the meeting held on the 6th May 1898 by the staff of the sanitary unit of the shipyard (physician’s assistant Sachuk), for example, it was stated that the barracks should be inspected weekly, the inhabitants be examined for scabies and lice infestation and all persons classified as risky or critical be quarantined without delay. In particular, working kalmucks were controlled, because they were the dirtiest and most plagued by lice.
For example, the minutes of a doctors’ meeting of the Yeniseysk District Health Office on 8 June mentioned a speech by doctor Lemeskin, which he had held on the occasion of bad hygienic conditions in communal dwellings: hygiene in the common living areas of the Institute for Teachers’ Education and the Pedagogical Institute are inadequate. There is no soap, nothing to wash the laundry (underwear); moreover, the students do not use the bathhouse and are infested with lice».
From documents we may draw the conclusion that there was an all-encompassing fight against epidemics, and everyone understood that the solution of the problem depended on himself.
In 1947, the network of district hospitals comprised 16 medical facilities and 5 medical contact points within the district. A whole galaxy of excellent doctors worked for the Yeniseysk Polyclinic in post-war years – Mikhail Nikolayevich Lemeskin, Antonina Semyonovna Hessina, Anna Nikiforovna Andreyeva and others.
In 1948 a variety of notable doctors, specialists of highest qualification were working for the institution – Doctor Gurich (head of the tuberculosis ward), Doctor Kagan (candidate of medical sciences, expert on infectious diseases), Doctor Stankov (ENT), Doctor Saperskiy (radiologist), Doctor Modik (dentist), Doctor Bendig (surgeon), academic Levashova (pediatrician) and others.
Early in the 1950s a district health office was established in the Yeniseysk district. Doctors and nurses passed through this authority; this was the place, where they were hired.
In those years, a remarkable, courageous woman – Antonina Semyonovna Hessina – fulfilled the function of the head of the district health authority. She hired all former camp prisoners who had gone through the GULAG and were physicians by profession, as she recognized that it was not possible to do without them - it was absolutely necessary to advance health care within the district, and there was a great lack of staff.
The first automobile of the ambulance
Lobanov (middle), 1954
According to the lists, which are being kept with the Yeniseysk State Archives, 122 persons were employed in the Yeniseysk District Hospital in 1952, among them 31 physicians (academics) and 91 persons with medium medical training. Most doctors looked back on a professional life of more than 10 years: Aleksandr Panteleimonovich Gurich, Vasily Pavlovich Stankov, Jakob Josefovich Bendig, Aleksandr Vasilyevich Kalyaev, Ida Augustovna Korablyova, Yekaterina Vasilyevna Ussanova, Yelisaveta Nikolayevna Botsharova, Maria Yakovlevna Laptyreva, Josif Abramovich Kachan, Vera Fyodorovna Tilmach, Aleksandr Dmitrievich Kulikov .
In 1956, the district hospital was located in four blocks, 3 of them were set up
for treatments, one – for the administrative area. During these years, V.D.
Poletayeva was the director of the children's clinic. The head of the surgical
department was N.S. Kuzhma, the "Therapy" area was led by M.V. Shpatokovskaya.
Participants of the medical conferende in Yeniseysk, March 1959.
1st row,
from left to right – Burmakin (doctor’s assistant), Lobanov (expert for
tuberculosis), Shukin (military commissioner), Bendig (surgeon), Nikolayeva (dentist),
Kochkarov (surgeon);
2nd row, bejind the military commissioner – S.K. Svereva (pediatrist);
3rd row, second from the left, A.N. Andreyeva – merited physician of the RSFSR;
third from the right in the 4th row – N.P. Papova.
The hospital additionally disposed of a big farm managed by N. I. Paklin. At that time there were 12 horses, 6 foals, 21 heads of cattle, 9 pigs, 135 units of poultry, 113 bee colonies. Such farms were located in Strelka and Maklakovo, and the hospital staff used to procure hay and firewood themselves.
1960 was an extremely difficult year for the central district hospital. Although no special rooms and areas available, sick people had to be admitted not only from the Yeniseysk district, which was attached to the Yartsovsk district, but also from the districts of Pirovskoe, Kasachinsk and Udereysk (nowadays Motygino). The rapid development of forestry, the significant increase of population, the extension of the catchment area up to 600 kilometers – all this increased the burden the physicians had to carry, but it did not improve the material situation of the hospital.
In the annual balance sheet for the year 1960 it is stated that 28 doctors with higher qualification worked in the hospital, among them 7 therapists, 3 surgeons, 3 district doctors, 2 neuropathologists, 2 tuberculosis specialists, 2 ophthalmologists.
The presence of physicians having expert knowledge of tuberculosis, as well as of special sickrooms sections TB patients show that the number of diseases in the district was very high.
According to yearly records, the following physicians worked for the hospital in 1960: K.M. Kochkarov - senior physician, surgeon, 19 years of professional experience, T.N. Yevtukhova – head of the therapy department,19 years of professional experience, V.A. Grushevskaya – therapy doctor, 19 years of professional experience, G.W. Lobanov – expert for tuberculosis, 23 years of professional experience, A.M. Andreyeva - neuropathologist, 12 years of professional experience, E.D. amarskaya – midwife and gynecologist, 12 years of professional experience, J.. Botshkaryowa – ENT doctor, 19 years of professional experience, K.I. Degtyarova - deputy senior physician, 29 years of professional experience, J.M. Ilchenko - expert in the field of infectious diseases, 14 years of professional experience.
The hospital provided a reception area, an X-ray room, a room for physiotherapy, an ECG room, a diagnostic laboratory, a department of pathology and anatomy, a pharmacy, an oncological practice, a consultation room for patients suffering from tuberculosis, as well as one for skin and venereal diseases.
In 1960 the polyclinic was frequented 73 343 times (adults), 6078 times doctors were called to visit patients at home.
What did inhabitants of Yeniseysk get sick of in those years? They often suffered from angina - 246 out of 9270, mechanical injuries - 325, diseases of the nervous system - 656, respiratory diseases – 813, etc.
After the consolidation of the district health office with the municipal one in the 1960s, Gennadiy Filippovich Rybnikov was appointed head of the institution.
In the annual reports we can find information on the fact that the number of physicians increased year by year; nonetheless there was a permanent lack of them. Each of the specialists had to carry an enormous burden. There was a serious lack of medical staff. The rooms of either hospital or polyclinic were situated in several buildings spread all over the town, they were to be heated by firewood and had no comfort at all.
The number of patients visiting the consultation hours increased steadily, as can be seen from the table below, which is taken from the 1960 report:
| 1957 | 1958 | 1959 | 1960 |
| 92787 | 101143 | 105146 | 110401 |
They seized very opportunity to treat citizens and preserve their health. On the 20th of August 1961, for example, the newspaper "Yeniseysk Truth" published material by doctor M. Perevalov on the usefulness of medicinal mud: "A source of medicinal mud also exists in our district – Lake Plotbishchenskoe. The healing earth of this lake was subject to research; it has properties for the treatment of chronic polyarthritis, women's diseases, lumbosacral radiculitis, chronic sciatic pain and other diseases. In the healing mud practice of the Yenisseysk Polyclinic the succeeded to restore hundreds of sick people’s health. In the healing mud premisses of our polyclinic, all patients who need a healing earth treatment without spending much time and financial resources for a stay in a spa resort can receive treatments for a period of 20-30 days. Each treatment takes about 30 minutes. The application is carried out on an outpatient basis by healing mudpacks, a very advantageous method, because one can apply the healing mud to any area of the body».
At present, the district's health care system is represented by the Central District Hospital in Yeniseysk, where more than a thousand specialists are frequently working.
The house on Kirov Street N° 82, in which the the Yeniseysk District Hospital
as accomodated
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