Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: A.J. Wright

  • “Without dissent”: Early black physicians in Alabama

    A.J. Wright Birmingham, Alabama, USA   Burgess Scruggs2 Cornelius Nathaniel Dorsette3 Hale Infirmary, Montgomery, Alabama4 Halle Tanner Dillon5 Alabama Medical Association Votes to Admit Negroes1 There is a brief but interesting note in the July 1953 issue of the Journal of the National Medical Association, the official voice of the organization founded in 1895 for African-American…

  • Hillman Hospital

    A.J. Wright Birmingham, Alabama, United States   Hillman Hospital complex, ca. 1929. The original structure on the right was erected in 1902 and the annex, in the middle, was added in 1913. On the left is the 1928 addition, or “new” Hillman. Alabama’s first operating medical school, the proprietary Graefenberg Medical Institute in the small…

  • What November may bring: The first 37 days of surgical anesthesia

    A.J. WrightBirmingham, Alabama, United States In medical history October 16 is known as “Ether Day” to commemorate dentist William Morton’s 1846 demonstration of ether inhalation for a surgical patient of Dr. John Collins Warren. The event is often described as the first public ether anesthetic because it took place before an audience of physicians and…

  • In the Waiting Room – Rebecca’s Doll

    A. J. Wright Birmingham, Pelham, USA Poet’s statement: I wrote“In the Waiting Room” after a visit with my mother-in-law to her doctor’s office in Colorado Springs. Passing other offices in the same complex, I noticed an unfinished puzzle on a table. “Rebecca’s doll” is a reflection on my daughter’s youthful fascination with playing “hospital” with…