The Department of Traumatology and Orthopedics of KhNMU is the oldest among the profile departments of higher educational institutions not only in Ukraine, but also in the whole post-Soviet space. It was organized in January 1921 on the initiative of a recognized domestic specialist orthopedist-traumatologist and a talented teacher, professor Samuil Leontievich Tregubov. Professor S.L. Tregubov has covered his fifty years of experience in the treatment of osteoarticular tuberculosis in his monograph “Bones and joints tuberculosis “, which was published by his students after the author’s death in 1949.

In 1944 S.L. Tregubov’s student, associate professor Elizaveta Petrovna Ryumshina, was elected as the head of department by competition. Conducting classes with students directly at the patient’s bedside was a kind of innovation of that time. In the postwar period, the priority areas of clinical and scientific work of the department were injuries treatment and prosthetics. Traditional studies of osteoarticular tuberculosis and congenital malformations of the musculoskeletal system also continued.

In 1962, Doctor of Medicine,Victor Pylypovych Trubnikov was elected as the head of department according to the competition. With the arrival of this energetic talented organizer, teacher, scientist and clinician, a period of intensification of all areas of the department’s activity began at the Kharkiv Medical Institute. Honored Scientist of Ukraine, prof. V.P., Trubnikov was the deputy editor-in-chief of the central professional journal “Orthopedics, Traumatology and Prosthetics” for a long time as well as the author of a number of fundamental works in our discipline and textbooks.

Professor Denys Dmytrovych Bitchuk was elected as the head of the department of traumatology, orthopedics and military field surgery of the KSMU in 1989. A capable teacher, talented surgeon and scientist, a representative of the Sitenko scientific school, became a worthy heir to traditions established by prof. V.P. Trubnikov.

Since 2008 the department is headed by Doctor of Medicine, prof. H.H. Holka. Domestic and foreign students of all faculties, interns, clinical residents, masters, PhD students study at the clinical bases of the department. Teaching is conducted in three languages: Ukrainian, Russian and English.

These days, applied (scientific and practical) research of the department is aimed at improving the diagnosis and treatment of osteoporosis, osteoarticular tuberculosis, development of new methods of injuries osteosynthesis of long bones of the extremities, treatment of injuries and diseases of the pelvis, joints, spine, endoprosthetics.