Spanish American War & WWI

Mary Murad & Sandra Haggerty

Spanish American War

April-August 1898 Spain declared war on the U.S. because the U.S. supported Cuba's wish to be independent of Spanish rule. Remember the Maine!: War slogan, a submarine mine exploded in Havana Harbor in Cuba, sinking the U.S. battleship Maine and killing 260 servicemen. The Treaty of Paris was signed in 1898

Spanish American War & Nursing

Nurses serving aboard the hospital ship RELIEF Poor sanitation and Disease in Army camps Women nurses employed to work in Cuba, military hospitals, and U.S. hospital ships Untrained nurses and volunteers all helped in the war effort Typhoid fever, Yellow Fever, Malaria

Hospital Ship RELIEF in Cuban Waters Operating Room

Spanish American War & Nursing

Many soldiers required hospitalization at home More deaths due to illness and disease compared to battle injuries Nursing corps post war: increase in the number of women nurses Later large decrease due to unsupportive military leaders

Clara Maass
Spanish American War Nurse Clara Maass died as a result of yellow fever. Army Contract Nurse Maass volunteered to participate in an experimental treatment program,after having survived the war. A stamp was issued in her honor in 1976.

Nursing during World War I: 1914-1918

More than 21,000 women enlisted in the U.S. Army during World War I to serve as uniformed nurses. Nearly half of them served in overseas locations. The mass deployment of nurses during World War I removed them from a structured professional culture and thrust them into an unfamiliar world of warfare where they became part of a team. Nurses served in base hospitals, Convalescent (evacuation) hospitals, casualty clearing stations (triage), trains, and transport planes Nursing during WWI led to many advancements in medicine and nursing care.

Nursing during World War I: Trench Warfare

The use of trench warfare during the war led to spread of many diseases and other health concerns. Trench warfare often led to stalemates that triggered many more casualties from vermin, disease, trench fever, trench foot, and dysentary. Living in trenches meant battling vermin such as rats and lice. Rats were large and very bold while lice ran rampant in the camps. Soldiers would either pick the lice off or burn them off with a lighter. Trench fever caused a shooting pain in the chin followed by a very high fever. Trench fever accounted for 15% of all cases of sickness in the British army. Trench foot was caused by standing and fighting in trenches saturated with water and mud. Feet would go numb, turn red and eventually blue. If left untreated, toes and sometimes whole foot could turn gangrenous. Dysentary was caused when soldiers either ended up fighting or hiding in the latrines dug within the trenches. Bacteria from the feces contaminated food and water which caused inflammation of the bowel, stomach pains, diarrhea, vomiting and fever.

Nursing during World War I: Trenches

Nursing during World War I: Volunteers

By 1914, the British army had formed an elite corps of army nurses. Many young women convinced parents to allow them to join the Red Cross to improve their domestic skills. These volunteers were organized into groups under the Voluntary Aid Detachments which was managed by the Red Cross. Eventually volunteers were sent to serve in France and Belgium primarily as nurses assistants. American women began to volunteer through the British Red Cross primarily as nurses and orderlies.

Nursing during World War I: Nursing Progress

The war led to improvements in educational requirements and training programs for nurses in America. It also helped to establish acceptance and respect for women in the profession. Training of nurses before this time emphasized the handmaiden approach to nursing which emphasized the role of nurses as a handmaiden (servant) to the physician and following WWI, nurses began to be seen as equal members of the team.

Criteria for becoming a nurse also became more strict: Nurses could not be married Had to be a graduate from an approved school of nursing Had to be female males were not accepted Had to be between ages of 25-35

Nursing during World War I: Medical Advancements

Concept of triage introduced: Casualty clearing stations used an Order of Evacuation as guideline if necessary to move the station had a way or sorting injuries and expected outcomes to maximize the number of survivors. Anesthesia: chloroform was primary anesthetic agent at beginning of war and was found to be potentially toxic. Eventually surgeons found a safer and more effective agent that was a mixture of nitrous oxide and oxygen that was easily controlled by stopping the gas. Infection Control: Dr. Theodore-Marin Tuffier performed wide debridement of the infected area in an attempt to avoid amputation found that immediately removing dead and damaged flesh helped prevent infection and gas gangrene. Also followed practice of inserting drains that provided constant irrigation.

Nursing during World War I: Medical Advancements

Skin grafting: Tuffiers debridement methods led to development of skin grafting large debrided wounds took months to heal from inside out and the healing process could be expedited if the wound was protected by skin. Blood Typing: Karl Landsteiner, a biochemist and pathologist working in United States, discovered blood groups in 1901 and the importance of matching blood groups between donors and recipients. American physicians and nurses introduced Landsteiners work in early 1915. Prothetics: Loss of jawbones, cheeks noses, eyes and ears left disfiguring holes specialists called in to create new nostrils, insert artificial eyes, or to repair or replace a shattered jaw.

Nursing during World War I: Nursing care

American, British and French women volunteered in mass numbers many giving up luxuries of a privileged life.

They travelled with barest essentials to tend injured, sick and dying men.
Nurses were forced to endure the harshest of environments, especially during the frigid winters in Europe. Their ankles swelled, and their feet constantly ached from standing in cold wet mud for hours. Nurses put themselves at risk for disease or injury, just as the soldiers did, but without a weapon to defend themselves with or even the pay (many were volunteers). There were no specialty divisions at the time: nurses assisted surgeons in ORs, in wards, removed blood encrusted uniforms, bathed the men, administered blood, gave injections, monitored vitals, debrided, sutured and dressed wounds as well as fed, read to and cradled the dying.

Nursing and Women post World War I

War lead to more freedom for women. The number of men at war meant women were forced to take over work in factories and farms. Army and Navy nurse corps were fully established and functioning womens suffrage movement was in full swing following the war women who had given up so much to serve alongside the soldiers during the army felt they had a right to vote and help determine future of the nation 19th amendment signed into constitution in 1920.

References
Feminist Review , No. 79, Latin America: History, war and independence (2005), pp. 20-35 Holder, V (2004). From Handmaiden to Right Hand: World War I and Advancements in Medicine. AORN Journal, vol. 80 (5), pg. 911-923. Holder, V (2004). From Handmaiden to Right Hand: World War I The Mud and the Blood. AORN Journal, vol 80 (4), pg. 652-665. Kalish,P. and Kalish, B. (2004). American Nursing: A History (4th Ed). New York, Lippincott Williams and Wilkins. Lovett, C. (1998). Remembering the Maine: Teaching about the SpanishAmerican.. Social Studies, 89(3), 123.