The Physician to Soldier Pipeline · Episode 13 of 14 · 23 min
Wide Awake
In 1938 and 1939 the American Board of Anesthesiology examined its first nine diplomates, because American medicine had left the work to dentists and nurses. War created demand for anesthesia everywhere, and crash twelve-week courses from 1942 built a profession. Henry Beecher helped design them, then asked badly wounded men at Anzio about pain and later changed the rules on human experimentation.
Who's who
- Henry K. BeecherHarvard anesthesia professor who studied battlefield pain and wrote on research ethics
- Meyer SakladOne of the first nine board-certified anesthesiologists
- Alice MagawNurse anesthetist for the Mayo brothers, called Mother of Anesthesia
- Ralph M. WatersChair of the wartime Subcommittee on Anesthesia
- Emery A. RovenstineSecretary of the Subcommittee on Anesthesia
- Edward D. ChurchillSurgical consultant in the Mediterranean theater and Beecher's chief
- Bjorn IbsenDanish anesthetist who opened the first intensive care unit in 1953
Where it happens
- Anzio, ItalyBeachhead where Beecher questioned 215 wounded men about pain
- Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston+2 more episodesSite of the 1846 ether demonstration
- Copenhagen, Denmark+2 more episodesSite of the 1952 polio epidemic and first ICU
- Bellevue Hospital, New York+1 more episodeOne of the first wartime anesthesia course sites
Timeline
- October 16, 1846Ether demonstrated at Massachusetts General Hospital
- 1938American Board of Anesthesiology established as a sub-board
- Summer 1942Twelve-week wartime anesthesia courses begin at four sites
- 1946Beecher publishes 'Pain in Men Wounded in Battle'
- 1953Ibsen opens the first intensive care unit in Copenhagen
- June 16, 1966Beecher publishes 'Ethics and Clinical Research' with twenty-two examples
Still debated
The Anzio saline story is treated as legend, and Beecher's own conduct and Cold War role are contested. The intensive care unit's descent from wartime shock wards is a compression of a more complicated chain.