Search Results

This chapter provides an overview of the medical administration in the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan between 1899 and 1940, arguing that the distinctive form of colonialism developed in Sudan shaped the medical services provided. It also discusses the different categories of personnel who practised Western medicine on behalf of the colonial state. Analysis of biographical information about Britain's military and civilian doctors and their terms of service suggests that both groups were middle class, well educated, and enjoyed financial and social standing comparable to their political counterparts. A discussion of Syrian and Sudanese medical personnel demonstrates clearly the way in which politics and economic policy influenced who delivered which medical services in different parts of the country at particular points in time. It also shows that British doctors' perception of racial difference, and their class, gender, and occupation hierarchies structured the training of Sudanese medical personnel and the medical service, counterbalancing the fluidity of the boundary drawn around the profession of medicine in Sudan.

Cuba has had a large medical presence in Haiti since 1998, when Hurricane Georges devastated the country. Cuba responded by sending hundreds of medical staff to help with emergency medical support. It has also trained over a thousand Haitians to become doctors. Some 300 Cuban doctors remained there, and were present when the earthquake struck in 2010. This chapter analyses their role during that tragic period. A year later a cholera outbreak resulted, and again Cuban medical personnel played a major role in bringing it under control. An overview of the Cuban role is provided, and an assessment of 15 years of medical support is provided.

Medical schools had long been responsible for the quality of care rendered civilians, but during World War II they took direct responsibility for the military's medical care as well. The proportion of faculty that enlisted in the armed services was much higher than that of the general profession. At the country's 52 general hospital units and 20 evacuation hospital units, the medical personnel, which numbered about 2,500, came almost entirely from academic medical centers. At home, schools were extremely short-staffed, but they nonetheless increased the production of doctors to meet both military and civilian needs. In addition, they conducted an extraordinary amount of war-related medical research, which enabled a dramatic reduction in death and suffering among troops in combat.

This book is about colonial medicine and its emphasis on colony. Colonial medicine suggests that we should understand overseas medical practice during the age of imperialism in the context of the interwoven political, economic, and social institutions and interests that constituted each different colonial regime. Such an emphasis is particularly important because colonialism, even within the British empire, took on a wide range of forms. Certainties about the binary division between colonizer and colonized are being challenged as we come to appreciate the roles played by members of the ‘colonized’ population in colonial administrations. This book seeks to describe and define the ‘colonial’ and the ‘medical’ in Sudan between 1899 and 1940. Colonial officials, including doctors, worked at physical frontiers, between provinces, nations, peoples, and zones of infection and non-infection. Colonial medicine in Sudan involved employing non-European doctors and training African medical personnel. Colonial doctors recognized that one of the main ways in which colonial rule changed epidemiology was by influencing patterns of population movement.

This chapter provides a summary description of the life and conditions experienced by internees in the Stanley camp. It notes that no one starved to death, and the fact remains that every day of internment there was something to eat. It further observes that many skilled medical personnel were interned and so few people died during internment, a total of less than 120. It reports that the interviews of former internees revealed that the Red Cross had done as much as possible and was extremely hindered by lack of cooperation from the Japanese authorities. It further reports that although Japan had not been a signatory to the Geneva Convention, the Japanese government had announced that it would follow the rules of the Convention. It observes that the Geneva Convention failed to note the vast difference between an Oriental, rice-based diet and a European diet.

In the history of war, and especially in discussions of the psychological trauma that can result from constant exposure to war induced injury and death, the experience of medical personnel is strikingly absent. Historically, the focus on combatant trauma has obscured the trauma of those who care for the injured and dying. The introduction examines the historiography of trauma and resilience, of wartime medical care, and theories of life-writing in order to contextualise the chapters which follow. An analysis of memoirs by medical personnel from the Second Anglo Boer War (1899-1902) is also included here.

This chapter considers the internationally approved standards of conduct for law enforcement officials and medical personnel. It examines the background of ethical texts adopted by the UN and Council of Europe for law enforcement officials and medical personnel with particular reference to the criteria suggested by Alfred Heijder regarding the merits of the different codes. Also, it suggests similar codes that will cover military personnel and lawyers, and studies the development of ethical principles for lawyers.

Informal payments to health care providers remain a common practice in former communist countries. Such payments are defined as the under-the-table remuneration of medical personnel in publicly financed health-care systems. In gaining access to health services, unofficial payments are most frequently made for hospital stays, especially for surgery or consultations with specialists. This chapter investigates the signification of this practice of informal payments: Does this particular informal approach to problem solving constitute a form of social protest, a helpful adjustment of an imperfect system, or a form of corruption? It argues that unofficial payments for medical care within the public health-care systems of the postcommunist region are an example of an informal practice that is in the main detrimental to the public good and reform efforts.

This chapter examines the state of American medicine during the Civil War. A little knowledge and hands-on experience were enough requirements for the lower levels of the medical service during the American Revolution. In 1775, as the first battles took place, local regimental surgeons were the only source of medical care available. Most of these surgeons took care of the sick and wounded from their own geographic area and were accountable only to their own line officers. They were never examined for medical competency, and no standards were in place for the medical service. Very few of the medical personnel who amputated limbs, dosed patients with the usual vile concoctions, and diagnosed illness for the military had had much formal training. In general, the state of medicine in America was very poor at the opening round of battles in the Revolution. The troops suffered from acute health problems, not just in the hospitals but also among the healthy.

This chapter presents an account of the plight of the people living in the Sahel, one of Eritrea's most inaccessible regions. It describes the devastation wrought by thirty years of war. It recounts experiences serving as a medical cadre among the pastoralist communities, particularly describes the impromptu cooperation between a liberation front and a marginalized population totally unaware of politics.

This chapter describes the Diplomatic Conference on the Reaffirmation and Development of International Humanitarian Law Applicable in Armed Conflicts, the first session of which met in Geneva from February 20 to March 29, 1974. The conference dealt with issues such as wars of national liberation as governed by the international law of war; the protection of medical personnel and transports; internal armed conflicts; the protection of the civilian population against the effects of hostilities; and the prohibition or restriction of use of various weapons.

The author explains why and how he decided to write this book. He says the idea of writing something that would bring the lived experience of doctors at war closer to the general public was originally broached by a high-ranking medical officer, who had been instrumental in helping to secure permission for the author's deployment to Afghanistan. The officer had read one of the author's previous books, The Last Amateurs, and wanted him to come up with a similar work about rear-located medical personnel. There was quite clearly a sense that a candid account of the everyday experience of combat surgical teams would be a welcome addition to the war literature. The result is a candid narrative that chronicles the commitment and fearlessness of the doctors and nurses at the field hospital “who have strong enough stomachs to mop up what we destroy.”