Author: Hektoen International
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The walking stick as a social marker in society
Mitchell BataviaNew York, New York, United States The walking stick, also referred to as a staff, crosier, shepherd’s crook, gadget cane, and cane, has fulfilled many roles over the centuries as a symbol for power,1-3 authority,2 weaponry,1,4 social status,1,4 faith,1,5 magic,1 smuggling,1 fashion,5 and physical support.6 Regardless of role, the stick has served as a social marker identifying…
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Colonial psychiatry and the pathologizing of the African mind in Kenya
Wanjiku DyerLos Angeles, California, United States In 1910, on the outskirts of Nairobi, the British colonial government converted a smallpox isolation center into what it called the Nairobi Lunatic Asylum.¹ By 1924, the facility had been renamed Mathari Mental Hospital. For the next four decades, it would serve as both a psychiatric institution and an…
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Segregated people, segregated blood
Howard FischerUppsala, Sweden “Are they afraid they’ll all turn black?Is that why our blood they lack?”1—From a poem by high school student Geraldyne Ghess In 1941, US leaders suspected that the country would soon be in a war “against a German aggressor, obsessed with ethnic purity and the racial symbolism of blood.”2 Unfortunately, much American…
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Fanny Hesse: Mother of microbiology
Howard FischerUppsala, Sweden “Her contribution to bacteriology makes her immortal.”1—Medical historians Arthur Hitchens and Morris Leikind “C’est un grand progrès!”2—Louis Pasteur Fanny Hesse (neé Angelina Fanny Eilshemius, 1850–1935) was born in New York City, the oldest of ten children in a family of Dutch origin. In 1874 she married German physician Walther Hesse (1846–1911) and…
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The nursing school in the Warsaw Ghetto
Howard FischerUppsala, Sweden “Despite extreme hardship and abject terror, the nursing school in the Warsaw Ghetto continued to provide the highest level of nursing education possible.”1 The Warsaw Jewish Nursing School was established in 1923 as part of the Czyste (“clean” in Polish) Jewish Hospital. The school received support from the Warsaw city government and…
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The great uncertainty
Anthony PapagiannisThessaloniki, Greece It was one of those episodes that often appear in works of fiction: the unusual circumstance, the odd coincidence, the thunderbolt out of a clear sky; an event that upsets the usual order of things, injects suspense, and drives the story according to the author’s fancy. Only this was not fiction but…
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Young Hitler’s blindness in World War I
Avi OhryTel Aviv, Israel During World War I, Corporal Adolf Hitler became blind during a gas attack in the trenches. He was examined by a young Jewish military physician, Karl Kroner, whose differential diagnosis was blindness due to mustard gas, malingering, shellshock, and/or “hysterical” blindness. He recommended transfer to the care of the famous neuro-psychiatrist…
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The medspeak language: Modern Johnsonese?
George ChristopherMichigan, United States Samuel Johnson (1709–1784) was a prominent eighteenth-century writer whose compositions include literary reviews of the works of Shakespeare, Addison, Dryden, Milton, Pope, and other major authors; scathing commentaries on moral and political issues such as the institution of slavery and the mistreatment of indigenous Americans; brief biographies; poems; a tragic play;…
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Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832): Medical aspects
Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832) is widely credited with inventing and popularizing the modern historical novel. Born in Edinburgh in 1771, he grew up during the intellectual ferment of the Scottish Enlightenment. At eighteen months, he developed a fever followed by permanent lameness in his right leg—consistent with paralytic poliomyelitis. In the hope that the country…
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Virginity now and then
Virginity is sometimes regarded as an indelicate subject. It is also one of history’s most cultural artifacts, less a biological fact than a social fiction refined over millennia. At its most literal, it means to have never engaged in sexual intercourse. Over time, however, it has become tied to ideas of purity, honor, and social…