İbrahim Refik Saydam, the fourth Prime Minister of the Turkish Republic, was born in 1881 in İstanbul. He graduated from Military School of Medicine with the rank of Physician captain. He received education in Berlin Military Academy of Medicine in Germany, Brandenburg, Danzig, Spandou and Scharite.

He carried out studies for preventing Cholera epidemic during the Balkan War fighting in Antalya and Çatalca front. At the time he was appointed as military field general health deputy inspector in 1914, he organized the bacteriology institution. Thus, he provided the production of Typhoid, Dysentery, Plague and Cholera vaccines as well as tetanus and dysentery sera and met the requirements of the army throughout the I. World War. He maintained his struggle with epidemic diseases while serving in Hasankale front. The vaccine he produced against Typhus was recorded in Literature of Medicine and was used in the German army in the I. World War and in Turkish War of Independence. In 1919, he landed in Samsun in Mustafa Kemal’s team with the rank of 9th Corps health deputy inspector and was appointed to the contagious diseases service directorship of Erzurum military hospital after Mustafa Kemal's headquarters in Erzurum was scattered. However, he refused this assignment and left the army. He participated in Erzurum and Sivas congress activities.  

In 1920, he became Beyazıt member of the Turkish Grand National Assembly and Head of Sanitary Department which is affiliated to the Attorneyship of National Defence. Beginning from the second period, he maintained his membership as İstanbul member of the Turkish National Assembly. The same year, he was elected Minister of Health and Social Services ( Sanitary and Social Welfare ). Refik Saydam, the first Minister of Health of the Turkish Republic, established the basic fundamentals of health services in term of 14 years. He localized domestic hospitals and maternity child welfare centers in Ankara in 1924 and subsequently in Erzurum, Diyarbakır, Sivas and many other provinces. Moreover, he attached importance to staff training in this field and organized sanitary courses; established medical student hostels, Hygiene Institution in 1928 and afterwards School of Public Health, tuberculosis dispensaries in İstanbul and Ankara.

Between 1931-1938, Refik Saydam served as deputy minister of Education and Minister of Finance at different dates. Following Atatürk’s death, he fulfilled the tasks of Ministry of Internal Affairs, general secretariat of Republican People’s Party and 15 years of Red Crescent Presidency. During his Prime Ministerial duty between 1939 and 1942, he laid special emphasis on sanitary matters. He expressed that "State Regimen is decayed from A to Z; it needs to be renewed" and followed a radical reform in state administration. He died in 1942 at the time of a study trip organized for regulation of food problem in İstanbul.