Samuel Batizfalvy

* Rimaszombat, August 26, 1826 – † Budapest, November 6, 1904 / physician, one of the founders of Hungarian orthopedics, corresponding member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (1868) ; ; He completed his secondary schooling in Osgyán and Rozsnyó. He studied humanities and evangelical theology in Levoča. After graduating, he participated in the 1848/49 War of Independence as a lieutenant in the Hungarian army. Afterwards, he studied medicine at the University of Pest, received his doctorate in 1855, and then obtained his diplomas as a surgeon and obstetrician in 1856. Between 1855 and 1858, he was a teaching assistant to Professor János Balassa. In 1864 he obtained a private teaching qualification, and in 1869 he opened his forty-bed “surgical and physical therapy [orthopedic] private medical institution”, which he later expanded with the first Budapest hydrotherapy institute. He was its director until his death. He was the founder of Hungarian orthopedics and orthopedic surgery, the initiator of therapeutic gymnastics in Hungary and the developer of its Hungarian technical language. He also published an annual report on the work of his institute (The results of the operation of the Budapest Surgical and Orthopaedic Private Medical Institution I–VII., Medicine, 1860–1866). His son, Béla Batizfalvy, committed suicide in January 1884. ; ; His main works: ; Instructions for stuffing and preserving birds, mammals, reptiles and fish, 1853, ; Botany, or a simple method of collecting and drying plants, 1853, ; Home physical therapy, 1857, ; Practical physical therapy, 1867, ; Pathology of spinal cord tumors, 1873.