Inventor Prof. Pavel Kozak

Pavel Kozak, a remarkable figure of Romanian genius with a deep love for his people and his country, suffered in his youth from a chronic skin disease that could not be cured for many years by the level of development of dermatological medicine at the time, even though he underwent – both literally and figuratively – an entire series of treatments that produced no result whatsoever.

However, he was neither discouraged nor defeated by the disease he suffered from. Displaying an extraordinary spirit of observation and a native intelligence rarely found in an ordinary patient, he had the determination and perseverance to seek out solutions on his own for easing his own suffering. Through tenacious work of scientific research and experimentation – under the careful guidance of leading authorities in the medical and pharmaceutical fields in Romania at the time – he rigorously, methodically and systematically discovered and developed the method that today bears his name, the Pavel Kozak Method ©.

He began his healing work – unrecognized by the medical establishment in Romania at the time – by first curing himself, and then his former companions in suffering – patients afflicted with various terminal forms of serious skin conditions – with whom he had spent many years together in the hospital bed at Floreasca.

The extraordinary results thus obtained made him understand that his method had concrete practical value, and he set out to offer it to other skin-disease sufferers as well, in order to give them too a real chance of returning to a normal life, fully cured.

The first reports about this new treatment possibility appeared in 1967 in several press articles in Romania, for example in the then very well-known magazine Flacăra. The results obtained, the large number of patients treated and cured, and the explicit requests for access to this method from many other patients of all social categories, including prominent medical figures, compelled the Romanian authorities of the time to consider the possibility of a scientific basis for the Kozak method; consequently, they agreed to carry out an organized scientific study at the Fundeni hospital in Bucharest between 1977 and 1979, where an entire series of tests of the Kozak method were conducted, supervised by authorized medical commissions.

As the results were indisputable, Pavel Kozak received the title of first-class scientific researcher of Romania, even though he had no formal academic medical training – something unacceptable at the time. He also received an invitation to take part in the Atlantic Congress of Dermatology in Montreal, Canada, in 1979, a first-ever participation for Romanian dermatology.

The results presented at the congress received unanimous confirmation of the method's validity. Following the information received from home and exasperated by the obstacles placed in his way by the authorities, he was compelled to remain abroad with the same goal: „the healing of dermatological patients”.

Initially in Germany, where he worked in various clinics achieving the same spectacular results recognized by the international and local press, in highly prestigious magazines such as „Stern”, which reported in great detail, over several pages, the remarkable successes achieved by Pavel Kozak in these clinics – something rarely seen in Stern magazine when it comes to medical matters, as the magazine is not specialized in this field.

His reach extended to patients from European countries such as England, the Netherlands, the Scandinavian countries, France and Italy, as well as from Australia, Japan, South America and, not least, Canada and the USA. In 1982 the Ontario Ministry of Health awarded the University of Toronto a grant for a research programme on chronic skin diseases, and the first clinical study within that programme was to use the Kozak method; in the 1982–1983 fiscal year the protocol was applied to nine children with epidermolysis bullosa at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto. In December 1982 Pavel Kozak was invited to present the method at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, United States, before a group of dermatologists, at the invitation of Dr Stephen I. Katz, head of the dermatology branch.

His treatments were used by actors, athletes, musicians and other public figures from various fields of activity of international renown. For health reasons he moved to Spain, to the institute opened in Cabanelles, where he carried out the same prestigious work, achieving exceptional results in diseases considered incurable, such as epidermolysis bullosa simplex, scleroderma, atopic dermatitis, etc.

The revolutionary year of 1989, the opening of the borders and the change of regime allowed him to return to the country, while he still carried out his medical work in Spain until 1998, when he opened the „Dermatonou Pavel Kozak” clinic in Bucharest, on Plantelor Street, a clinic that to this day strictly upholds the Pavel Kozak Method.

„Sala de așteptare” — a dedication by Adrian Păunescu

In 1981 the poet Adrian Păunescu dedicated to Pavel Kozak the poem „Sala de așteptare” (The Waiting Room), published in the volume Rezervația de zimbri. The poem is reproduced below in the original Romanian.

Pavel Kozak,
marele descoperitor român autodidact,
suferă în străinătate
de dorul țării lui.

L-am văzut, am vorbit.
E mai alb cu o sută de ani,
e mai trist cu distanța,
cu o boală
într-adevăr incurabilă.

Deschide, Mamă, ușile
și iartă
pe toți copiii tăi
ce nu te-au pângărit,
și o să fii
mai puternică decât toate.

Mult creier românesc plânge
în sala de așteptare
a Planetei Pământ.

Încotro s-o ia?
Ce tren să apuce?

Pe unii, rușinea,
pe alții, ambiția,
pe ceilalți umilința
îi țin departe și-i înrăiesc.

Și trenurile trec prin gară
și viața-i scumpă.
Încotro — fiecare?

Mamă, mamă,
trimite un tren după ei
să se-ntoarcă,
într-o duminică dimineața
a-ntregului
neam românesc,
să stea la prânz la masă
și luni să se-apuce de treabă.

Years later, Pavel Kozak spoke about that period on Romanian Television, in the programme hosted by Mihai Tatulici on 17 July 1992: In my personal opinion, the magazine «Flacăra» did not take the question of medical priority lightly — these were serious matters. Adrian Păunescu did everything he could for me, and I thank him. He was also a guest on Adrian Păunescu’s programme „Schimbul de noapte”.

Documents

Documents kept by the family. Click any of them to view it full size.

The correspondence and appraisals file

The correspondence received between 1979 and 1989, and the file of appraisals of the method. Patient names are covered.

Appraisals written by physicians after examining their own patient

The correspondence, 1979–1989

The file „Appraisals of the Pavel Kozak Method"