The civil war involved a lot of
medical attention. They started off with ninety-three surgeons and
assistant surgeons. But when the war ended they had gone through
eleven thousand surgeons. From these surgeons twenty-four resigned
to go to the South and three assistant surgeons were dropped for
being disloyal.
Most soldiers had a risk of dying from diseases than dying in battle.
Since they lived in an unsanitary and cramped up camp site diseases
would be passed around. They would end up with diseases such as
the chicken pox, mumps. But the deadly ones were the measles, thyroid,
dysentery, and diarrhea.
The nurses during the war were called “Angels of the Battlefield”.
More than two thousand women helped during the civil war. All of
the nurses were volunteered nurses so they didn’t get paid.
Their duties were to clean wounds, give out the medication, comfort
those dying, go out in to the battlefield and look for wounded soldiers,
and assist surgeons in operations.
Surgeons would also perform amputations, where they had cut off
a limb. But this was performed more and more often. So the surgeons
would have to perform an amputation in less than fifteen minutes.
In less than fifteen minutes they would have to calm the soldiers
down with chloroform, stop the blood flow with a tourniquet, and
then get a saw and cut through the bone. When they were done they
would sew back the major arteries and veins. These amputations were
performed in occasions like when a Minnie ball would hit a limb
it would crack the bone making skin and dirt go in to it.
Surgeons would use many instruments like bandages, splinters, ointments,
and knives. They also had different kinds of medication for pain.
Like morphine, they would either give it in a capsule or as injection,
sometimes they would make it in to dust and sprinkle it on to the
wound. They would use chloroform when they were going to perform
an amputation to unconscious a soldier. But most soldiers were addicted
to opium pills, so when they would get wounded they would ask for
those pills.
Other things that caused deaths were infections from open wounds
or amputations not taken care of well. Some soldiers died form chloroform
poisonings. They all didn’t die in the battlefield.
Civil War Hospital
*Non-Sanitary
*Poor Hygiene
*No Knowledge of Infections
*Not Many Train Professionals
*No Proper Medical Tools
*Not Many Good Medicine
*No Proper Care
Hospital Tents
Hospital Today
*Sanitary
*All Trained Professionals
*Good Hygiene
* Proper Tools
*Have Knowledge of Infections
*Good Medications
*Proper Care
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