[Surgical work of Dr. Vladan Djordjević]

Dr. Vladan Djordjević was the first surgeon in Serbia in today's meaning of that word. After graduating medicine in Vienna 1869, he spent two years specialising surgery at the First Vienna University Surgical Clinic led by Professor Theodor Billroth, including almost a year as a war surgeon at the Prussian military service during the Prussian-French war (1870/71). After returning to Serbia, Dr. Vladan Djordjević dealt with general medical and surgical practice. Different commitments and his own interests gradually distracted him from medicine and surgery, so that he gave them up in 1884. In spite of short practice in surgery, Dr. Vladan Djordjević gave an important contribution to surgery in Serbia. Close to 200 surgical procedures, of which we have evidence, constituted an important event for surgery in Serbia where these procedures had not been performed before him. Although a number of surgical procedures he performed was not high, they were important, not only were they the first operations in Serbia, but also they were often serious, sometimes complex and performed under very modest circumstances, but usually with good success. They belong not only to the general surgery, but to a number of surgical specialities, such as ophtalmology, maxillofacial surgery, otorhinolaringology, urology, orthopedic and trauma surgery, gynecology and obstetrics, thoracic surgery and neurosurgery.