Avram Balaban - Balalanoglu (1865- 1913)

Avram Balaban - Balalanoglu (1865- 1913), was skilled surgeon and gynecologist, who performed difficult surgeon interventions.
He was also considered to be a very good doctor and a humanist, having in mind the fact, that he worked in the hospital for the poor “Guraba Hasta Hanesti”.

Born in Endurljuk in 1865 (Kesarija, Turkey), in 1890 he graduated at the Faculty of Medicine in Carigrad and got the title “doctor of medicine and surgery”.
After, his graduation he worked in Sozopol (Bulgaria).
For a very short period of time he was assigned a municipal doctor in Ohrid.
From Ohrid he continued his brilliant doctor’s career in Struga, Pristine and Elbasan. Everywhere he went he gained the affections from the local population and the Turkish authorities. Then, he came to work in Bitola from (1899 or 1901), and there in a special building in the garden of his own house, he opened a private shelter with several hospital rooms, where he was running a private practice and an operation hall.
He also opened his own pharmacy nearby Jeni Amman (at the wooden market). During the Balkan wars, he actively participated in destroying one of the disastrous epidemic of the time, spotty typhus.But, an easily infectious disease took his life in 1913 and Bitola lost one of its most experienced doctors.

Excerpt from: DISTINGUISHED PEOPLE FOR BITOLA - authors: Lence Andonovska, Naume Gorgievski, Blagoj Nikolov, Trajko Ognenovski, Gordana Pesevska, Aneta Stefanovska, Svetlana Taleska ; translation in english Vesna Milevska. NIUL "St. Clement Ohridski": Municipality of Bitola