Learn Hardcore Russian: Педиатр сказал, что всё в порядке, но посоветовал чаще менять пелёнку после сна. - The pediatrician said that everything was fine, but advised changing the swaddling cloth more often after sleep.

Breakdown of Педиатр сказал, что всё в порядке, но посоветовал чаще менять пелёнку после сна.

Why are сказал and посоветовал in the masculine singular form?

In the past tense, Russian verbs agree with the subject in gender and number.

Here the subject is педиатр, which is grammatically masculine singular, so you get:

If the speaker were clearly referring to a female pediatrician, many speakers would say:

So these verb forms tell you something about the grammatical gender of the subject.

Why is there no он before посоветовал?

Russian often leaves out subject pronouns when the subject is already clear from context.

So instead of saying:

Russian very naturally says:

English usually repeats he, but Russian does not need to.

What does что mean here?