Emergency War Surgery NATO Handbook

Foreword

United States Department of Defense

The success of any military health care system in wartime is directly related to the number of casualties adequately treated and returned to duty with their units. This must be accomplished as soon and as far forward in the theater of operations as possible.

The Second Battle of Bull Run near Manassas, Virginia, was one of the major engagements of the United States Civil War. Three days after that great battle, three thousand wounded men still lay on the field. Relatives traveled to the front and took their loved ones home for treatment rather than leave them to the uncertain ties of military medicine. We have made phenomenal progress in the century since that battle occurred.

I have had the privilege of being a physician for nearly forty years. Half of that time was spent on active duty in the military services and the other half was spent in the civilian sector. I have participated in the delivery of health care in every conceivable setting: in a battlefield tent in Korea; on a hospital ship; in an air squadron; from austere county and state hospitals to large, glossy high technology institutions. I have seen people strive for, and achieve, excellence in all those settings. I see it now in the military health care system, and no one is more proud than I of the accomplishments and the quality of that system and of the special type of men and women who make the system work. Our system is not without its problems and its frustrations. It takes a long time for equipment to be delivered; the personnel system doesn't always provide the proper mix of people in a timely manner to get the job done; but with rare exceptions, the medical mission is accomplished in exceptional fashion.

This handbook should serve as a constant reminder that ours is a high calling We are here to save lives, not to destroy them. We are committed to the future, not the past, and to the primary mission of military medicine, which is to keep the soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines alive and whole: in the words of Abraham Lincoln, to minister to "him who has borne the brunt of battle."

This revised edition represents the contributions of talented and gifted health professionals from the military services as well as from the civilian sector. All who contributed have the grateful appreciation of the editorial board for the enthusiasm, dedication, and perseverance which made this revision possible.

William Mayer, MD
Assistant Secretary of Defense
(Health Affairs)

Approved for public release; Distribution is unlimited.

The listing of any non-Federal product in this CD is not an endorsement of the product itself, but simply an acknowledgement of the source. 

Operational Medicine 2001

Health Care in Military Settings

This web version is provided by The Brookside Associates Medical Education Division.  It contains original contents from the official US Navy NAVMED P-5139, but has been reformatted for web access and includes advertising and links that were not present in the original version. This web version has not been approved by the Department of the Navy or the Department of Defense. The presence of any advertising on these pages does not constitute an endorsement of that product or service by either the US Department of Defense or the Brookside Associates. The Brookside Associates is a private organization, not affiliated with the United States Department of Defense.

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