Hospitals of the Korean Conflict (original) (raw)

Future Deployable Medical Capabilities and Platforms for Navy Medicine

The Director, Medical Resources, Plans, and Policy (N-931) asked CNA to analyze potential alternatives for Navy Medicine's future deployable medical platforms, focusing on the 2015-2025 time frame. Specifically, N-931 directed CNA to: (1) Analyze future operating environments; (2) Analyze the medical capabilities required by those environments; (3) Describe and analyze generic potential platforms that will supply those capabilities; (4) Analyze the requirement-setting process and funding cycle, to draw recommendations for Navy Medicine's actions. Future operating environments could require Navy Medicine to support a wide variety of missions, including homeland security, operational maneuver from the sea, and managing the consequences of biological and chemical attacks. Our analyses show that there will be a continuing need for both land-based and sea-based medical platforms because no single platform is optimal in all circumstances. Among sea-based platforms, we found that v...

Injuries Sustained to the Upper Extremity Due to Modern Warfare and the Evolution of Care

The Journal of Hand Surgery, 2007

The formation of the American Society for Surgery of the Hand was related to world conflicts and hostilities. Therefore, it is appropriate that upper-extremity surgeons understand injuries resulting from modern-day combat. Because of ongoing warfare, many countries have experienced a large increase in the number of wounded service members and civilians, particularly wounds of the extremities. As a result of increased rate of survival in battlefield trauma in part because of the use of modern body armor, there is increasing complexity of extremity injuries that require complex reconstructions. Decreased mortality and a consequent increase in the incidence of injured extremities underline the need for the development of new treatment options. The purpose of this presentation is to describe upper-extremity injury patterns in modern warfare, the levels of care available, and the treatment at each level of care based on the experience

Treatment of War Wounds: A Historical Review

Clinical Orthopaedics and Related Research®, 2009

The treatment of war wounds is an ancient art, constantly refined to reflect improvements in weapons technology, transportation, antiseptic practices, and surgical techniques. Throughout most of the history of warfare, more soldiers died from disease than combat wounds, and misconceptions regarding the best timing and mode of treatment for injuries often resulted in more harm than good. Since the 19th century, mortality from war wounds steadily decreased as surgeons on all sides of conflicts developed systems for rapidly moving the wounded from the battlefield to frontline hospitals where surgical care is delivered. We review the most important trends in US and Western military trauma management over two centuries, including the shift from primary to delayed closure in wound management, refinement of amputation techniques, advances in evacuation philosophy and technology, the development of antiseptic practices, and the use of antibiotics. We also discuss how the lessons of history are reflected in contemporary US practices in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Levels of medical care in the global war on terrorism

The Journal of the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons, 2006

Trauma care for military personnel injured in Iraq has become increasingly sophisticated. There are five levels, or echelons, of care, each progressively more advanced. Level I care provides immediate first aid at the front line. Level II care consists of surgical resuscitation provided by highly mobile forward surgical teams that directly support combatant units in the field. Level III care is provided through combat support hospitals--large facilities that take time to become fully operational but offer much more advanced medical, surgical, and trauma care, similar to a civilian trauma center. Level IV care is the first echelon at which definitive surgical management is provided outside the combat zone. Level V care is the final stage of evacuation to one of the major military centers in the United States, where definitive stabilization, reconstruction, or amputation of the injured extremity is performed.

Forward Surgery in the Korea War The Mobile Army Surgical Hospitals

2018

In World War I, hospital equipment and mobile surgical teams were transported, together with their equipment and tentage, in trucks across the front. 7(p69) In World War II, the European and North African theaters of operation generally employed linear battlefields where combat support and combat service support units provided services by doctrine along fairly defined battle lines in the mountains and fields of the European continent and the deserts of Africa. The intent was to bring definitive care to the seriously wounded in far forward areas through auxiliary surgical groups. Close attention was paid to the selection of individuals to compose surgical teams within the groups, balancing the need for varying specialties, as well as the requirement of healthy young men capable of performing major surgery of the abdomen, chest, and extremities. The theory of bringing well-trained surgeons to the critically wounded, rather than the older method of evacuating the seriously wounded far to the rear for definitive surgical care, was proven logical and sound. This helped reduce the mortality and morbidity among the troops wounded in the combat zone. Because chest and abdominal wounds formed the majority of wounded cases, it was emphasized that the specialist must also be a good general surgeon. 9(pp385-386) The other side of the conflict in Asia is contrasted in the surgical support provided in World War II to the Pacific and China-Burma-India theaters of operation where the jungle canopy and island combat made the fight nonlinear. Here portable surgical hospitals bore the brunt of front line definitive surgery. They lacked generators, electrical illumination, refrigerators, suction apparatuses, and resuscitation equipment. Because of this, the portable surgical hospital could not operate independent of clearing companies and reinforcement by surgical teams. 9(p573)

From the Frontlines to the Homefront: The Crucial Role of Military Orthopaedic Surgeons

The Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery, 2009

Approximately 33,000 American ser-vice members have been wounded inthe wars in Iraq and Afghanistan dur-ing the past six years. Providing treat-ment as soon as possible after injury has saved lives and preserved optimalfunction for most of the personnelwounded in the conflicts. Forwardsurgical teams have performed this lifeand limb-saving work. Orthopaedicsurgeons are essential members of these teams because the majority of service members who are wounded inaction sustain musculoskeletal in-juries. From the onset of the military actions in Iraq and Afghanistan, or-thopaedic surgeons from the Army,Navy, and Air Force have served in thesurgical units providing this care.These facilities range in size from two-surgeon resuscitative surgical teamsnear forward combat operations (Figs.1-A and 1-B) to sophisticated fieldhospitals (Fig. 2). Continuously man-ning these battlefield surgical teamsand caring for the large numbers of service members with musculoskeletalinjuries have created many logistic andpersonnel challenges for the armedforces.The goal of this article is toprovide an overview of some of thebackground, challenges, and rewardsrelevant to service as an orthopaedic surgeon in today’s armed forces. Itincludes a limited historical perspectiveon the important advances that have improved care for injured servicemembers, some unique aspects affecting caregivers in the high operational tempoof present-day combat areas, and adescription of how current military operations impact orthopaedic surgeons and their families.