Ion N. Petrovici

Ion N. Petrovici

Ion N. Petrovici (born August 19, 1929 in Ploieşti ) is a German neurologist , professor of neurology and psychiatry at the Medical Faculty of the University of Cologne and director of the Neurological Clinic Cologne-Merheim . He described the crossed Asyphigmo-Pyramidal Syndrome in 1962 .

Ion N. Petrovici was born on August 19, 1929 in Ploieşti ( Romania ), where he graduated from the state high school Petrus und Paulus in 1947 with the Abitur. He completed his medical studies at the University of Bucharest in 1953 with the state medical examination and received his doctorate with the thesis Degenerative Discopathies .

Petrovici received further training in neurology from Arthur Kreindler and Vlad Voiculescu in the Neurology Clinic of the Institute for Neurological Research of the Romanian Academy of Science from 1956 to 1959.

In 1964, Ion N. Petrovici joined the Bucharest University Neurosurgery Clinic as head of the preoperative diagnostics department. Together with Constantin Arseni, Director of the Neurosurgical Clinic, Petrovici published the monograph Vascular Diseases of the Brain and Spinal Cord in 1965 and was the main speaker at the National Congress of Neurology in Bucharest in 1966 on the subject of tumors of the temporal lobe .

Ion N. Petrovici moved to Germany in 1969, where he started working in the Clinic for Neurology of the Max Planck Institute for Brain Research under the direction of Klaus-Joachim Zülch . This is where the long collaboration with K.-J. Zülch, who invited him to the field of neurological research so that it, in addition to its obligations as a hospital doctor Petrovici was possible to work scientifically and in 1978 with a thesis on Hemispheric differences and interhemispheric transfer of learning in patients with focal brain lesions to habilitieren . In 1983 he was awarded the rights of an adjunct professor for neurology and psychiatry at the University of Cologne by the minister of culture of North Rhine-Westphalia .

Cologne-Merheim Clinic

In 1985, Petrovici was appointed director of the Neurological Clinic Cologne-Merheim, academic hospital of the University of Cologne, a position he held until his retirement in 1994.

Scientifically, he worked on cerebro-vascular diseases, on the therapy of malignant brain tumors, on the neurological localization theory and, above all, on special problems in neuropsychology , such as functional hemispherical specialization, interhemispheric transfer of information, the left (non-dominant) brain hemisphere and the language. The results of these studies have appeared in 14 articles in monographs and manuals and in over 200 articles in specialist journals.

His contributions to the development of neuroscience were recognized by his honorary membership in the Romanian Academy of Medical Science and in 2003 by the Diploma of Academic Merit and the award of the G. Marinescu commemorative coin from the Romanian Academy.

Ion N. Petrovici is a member of the German Society for Neurology , German Society for Clinical Neurophysiology , German Society for Neuropsychology , Società Italiana di Neurologia , European Neurological Society , New York Academy of Sciences and Fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine (London).

Corresponding eponyms

• The Petrovici-Fradis syndrome , crossed Asphygmo-pyramidal syndrome with occlusion of the carotid artery. Psychiat.Neurol., Basel 144: 137-155 (1962)
• Petrovici's sign , amplification of the hand-grip reflex with simultaneous triggering of the tonic sole reflex. Psychiat.Neurol.Neurochir., 71: 259-263 (1968)