SERVICE HOSPITALS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25385, 17 November 1943, Page 4

SERVICE HOSPITALS

PROBLEMS IN SOUTH PACIFIC TREATMENT OF MANY AILMENTS (P.A.) AUCKLAND, Nov. 16. An indication of the problems which have to be met by service hospitals in the South Pacific area is to be gained from an article on the work of an American naval mobile hospital which has been sent to New Zealand by the United States Navy Department. “ We have found,” said Lieutenant-com-mander J. H. L. Heintzelman, head of the medicine section of the hospital. ’’ that we treat virtually every ailment that we treated back in the United States. Surprising to many doctors has been the fact that children's diseases break out suddenly. Youths of 19 and 20 have suddenly had severe mumps, chicken pox, or diphtheria. Sore throats, athlete's foot, pneumonia, heart ailments, and arthritis have been common. In addition, the hospital has experienced the expected run of malaria, intestinal diseases, and dengue fever. One of the hospital’s problems is that of men intentionally trying to be sent home. This sort of case is rare, but it sometimes occurs,” said Lieutenant-com-mander Heintzelman. "We faced the same problem in industrial medicine in the United States. You cannot say that a man has no pain. If you tried it on a witness stand a lawyer could make a fool out of you in five minutes. "Approximately 10 per cent of the cases-received at any of the mobile hospitals,” he added, " are nervous and mental disorders. The object is to return as mnay of these men to duty as possible and to evacuate others. Night bombing raids, the tension of action, and lack of sleep are regarded as the greatest contributing factors. Patients of this type who need protracted treatment form a lower percentage than in civilian life, largely because men suspected of mental disorders are rejected at the outset.”