Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: history of hospitals

  • Santa Margherita da Cortona

    Susan Brunn PuettJ. David PuettChapel Hill, North Carolina, United States From humble beginnings to years as a mistress, Margherita altered her path to become a tertiary Franciscan penitent, attending the ill and poor, founding a hospital, and devoting herself to Christ. She was in the vanguard of several other women of the late Middle Ages…

  • St. Fabiola and her hospital

    In about AD 380, a wealthy patrician matron gave money for a hospital to be built in Portus, the ancient port of Rome. This hospital was one of the first of its kind in the western part of the Roman empire, designed to provide care for the multitude of poor people living in the capital.…