Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: physical disfiguration

  • Book review: The Facemaker: One Surgeon’s Battle to Mend the Disfigured Soldiers of World War I

    Howard FischerUppsala, Sweden “A chirurgien should have…the harte of a lyin…the eyes of a hawke…[and] the hands of a woman.”—John Halle, English surgeon (c. 1529–c. 1568) Dr. Harold Gillies (1882–1960) was born in New Zealand to a family of Scottish origin. He studied medicine at Cambridge and took further training in otorhinolaryngology. When the First…

  • The Sorokdo National Hospital of South Korea

    Lucy EumNew Brunswick, Canada Hansen’s disease, also known as leprosy, has historically been a highly stigmatized condition.1 For centuries it was thought to be a curse, a punishment for sin, or a hereditary disease.2 It was not until 1873 that a Norwegian scientist, Gerhard Henrik Armauer Hansen, discovered the bacterial cause: Mycobacterium leprae.3 While Hansen’s…