New Medical Inventions During World War 1

World War I was a war of innovation with new artillery and tactics, but also a deadly war in which approximately ten million soldiers died in or injuries sustained from battle. As injuries increased throughout the war, the need for medical assistance was constantly growing. Surgery is considered an art and like art, it evolved and new techniques were developed, making an injury that could kill someone survivable. For instance, in the Civil War most surgeons would immediately amputate and in World War I surgeons began trying much harder to save limbs. Blood transfusion allowed surgeons to reduce patient death from blood loss because of the ample supply of blood from fellow soldiers. Sanitation improvements led to fewer deaths from infection

Why was the invention of penicillin so important in the context of WWII? What were some other advances in medicine that were

During any war, medical advancements are commonly made in response to the atrocities that take place during these bloody and gruesome times. World War II is no exception. During World War II, medical advances simply had to be made to keep soldiers alive. With all the victims of bullet wounds and diseases spreading around, treatments had to be invented or advanced. I chose this topic because science and medicine is very fascinating to me and I want to become a doctor when I grow up. During the war, penicillin, sulfanilamide, atabrine, plasma, and morphine were used in abundance and saved a countless number of lives.

Modern medicine is a fascinating thing. Since the development of medical technology, the total mortality rate has dropped immensely, while the percent of medical care has skyrocketed. There is a clear correlation between the two. But medicine has taken a long time to develop. During the civil war, people died from things that seemed so simple, like diarrhea. As the book The Killer Angels shows, many brave men lost their lives to many different afflictions, including gunshot wounds, disease, and botched surgery.

At the end of the war the United States won victory and abolished slavery nation wide. The total of fatalities overall throughout the whole war was around 750,000 but originally the count was 618,222. Medicine is the science and practice of treatment, prevention of harm to health, and overall is something that we use to help keep healthy. Life or death could depend on medicine or medical assistance. We’ve obviously come a long way in the medical field and we’re currently fairly advanced in medicine.

George Wunderlich once stated, “The American Civil War often gets credit for ending slavery and reshaping the federal government in this country. But the war between the states has another, often overlooked legacy: It may have started a new era in modern medicine” (“Civil War Medicine Quotes”). Contamination of medical equipment, poor sanitation methods, and lack of efficient medical procedures all led to the spread of disease, which resulted in death. However, modern medicine has significantly improved from the Civil War, due to its horrendous medical practices. The Civil War had countless impacts on the nation, but its most significant impacts were the advances in medical equipment, procedures and sanitation.

World War I was one of the bloodiest wars causing more than three hundred thousand casualties and out of those, one hundred twenty thousand of them resulted in death. Medical techniques had hardly improved from the Civil War,

Throughout history there were many gruesome and extensive wars that took place, like in the American Revolutionary War, Civil War, World War 1 and World War II. The medical procedures from the Revolutionary War to World War II have dramatically changed from what they knew then to what they knew of during World War II. For example, the Revolutionary war lacked so much knowledge about healing the wounded most died from infected wounds, in comparison to number of deaths in World War II little to none died from noncritical treated wounds. Another example, is the different anesthetics that were used throughout all these wars that helped treated different pains. Within these wars mentioned played major roles in the development of different medical techniques, procedures, and treatment.

Imagine going through all the pain in surgery and infections. Medicine during the Civil War can be compared to today’s medicine. For instance the surgical instruments, infections, where surgeries took place and where they take place now, sanitized and unsanitized tools and equipment. Today’s infections have changed greatly over time due to the change in sanitary conditions and the equipments surgeons use today.

Over seventy years ago the world was tossed into a war that touched every corner of the globe. The war would take the lives of over sixty million people from it’s start in 1939 to it’s end in 1945. Over those six years each side would develop new technologies to kill and destroy the enemy. However, the Allies biggest advantage would be their advancements in medicine that allowed more men to return to the front.

New discoveries spawn more medical research in medical colleges. In 1910, Abraham Flexner of the Carnegie Foundation publishes his study on medical education, and induces major medical education reform. Medical knowledge flourishes and specialists account for 20% of physicians in 1940. Hospitals begin to embellish new medical technology as physicians relied on the hospital as a source of access to new technology and as a facility in which to care for their sickest patients. (Writer, Dominguez, 2011, 2-6)

In the 19th and early 20th centuries treatment for injuries and sickness was a mixture of common sense and magic. Some patent medicines simply took a scattershot approach. The scattershot approach was a wide range of studies and cures at random rather than focusing on particular issue that needs to be solved. Country doctor with vaccines, no laboratory tests, and not many effective medicines were responsible for a lot. They took on the taks in treating a wide range of medical problems like broken bones, wounds, chronic conditions, and acute sickness.

With this knowledge, they could move away from solely relying on prevention to adding some methods for combating disease. One specific method they moved towards was the usage of penicillin and various other antibiotics during the 1920s. These drugs had a big success and adaptation rate due to the world wars and economic turmoil. However, there was a limit to these drugs as seen with penicillin it was beneficial against inhibiting the growth of gram-positive bacteria already inside the body. If scientists and medics did not know that bacteria cause disease, antibiotics would not have been discovered because antibiotics are grown and cultured like pathogenic bacteria

World War Two, a harsh period of time in the 1930s-1940s, filled with controversial arguments, political battles, fights to the death, but most importantly, medical advancements. Did you know that without the research and discoveries made during World War Two, our medical programs would probably be lacking the information we have today? It’s very true, and in my opinion, the war strengthened our medical abilities, and it really put our world to the test. New medicine had been discovered, while old medicine had been improved; horrible medical experiments performed by the Nazis occurred during this time; but most importantly, World War Two has affected our medical programs that we have presently. These

World War I was made even worse by the work of industrial chemists. In July 1917, troops based in Ypres, Belgium, reported a shimmering cloud around their feet and a strange peppery smell in the air. Within 24 hours they started to itch uncontrollably and developed horrific blisters and sores. Some started coughing up blood. This was all results of one of the most deadly chemical weapons deployed in battle, mustard gas. Because mustard gas can be absorbed through the skin, gas masks were useless. Even fully clothed soldiers weren’t fully protected. Towards the end of the Great War, this gas had not only killed and crippled but instilled terror across the battlefield. Mustard gas was produced for the first time in 1822 but its harmful