Whose Side Are You On? Complexities Arising from the Non-Combatant Status of Military Medical Personnel
Originally published in Monash Bioethics Review, 2023 Jan 11. doi: 10.1007/s40592-022-00168-2 Abstract Since the mid-1800s, clergy, doctors, other clinicians, and military personnel who specifically facilitate their work have been designated “non-combatants”, protected from being targeted in return for providing care on the basis of clinical need alone. While permitted to use weapons to protect themselves… Read more »
Experiences of a Prisoner of War: World War 2 In Germany
Re-Print Stephenson Vol 9 No 1 E Stephenson2 On 16 December 1943, I was sitting at the Navigator’s seat in a very noisy Lancaster bomber over Berlin when something occurred that changed the pattern of my life. We had just dropped 13,000 pounds of bombs… a 4,000 pound “cookie” plus incendiaries and we were stooging… Read more »
A Life of Service to Veterans
Originally published: 13 May 2014 by Sydney Local Health District, NSW Government As an 18-year-old, when Norton Duckmanton watched his friend fatally crash a Mosquito dive bomber during Pacific War training he couldn’t have known that the moment would define his 66-year career in dentistry. Though he was unable to cry at the military funeral,… Read more »
The Battle of the River Plate: Excerpts from the Diary of Surgeon Commander Jack Cussen RN, PMO of HMS EXETER
Reprinted from the Journal of the Royal Naval Medical Service Commentary HMS EXETER, the second of two York Class heavy cruisers, was launched in 1929. She had a displacement of 8,400 tons, a complement of 628 and main armament of three twin 8-inch guns in addition to AA guns and torpedoes. At the outbreak of… Read more »
Assessing Medical Suitability for Employment and Deployment in the ADF
Assessing Medical Suitability for Employment and Deployment in the ADF Commander Neil Westphalen, Royal Australian Navy Reserve Introduction This article follows previous papers by the author, regarding occupational and environmental medicine in the ADF.1 They asserted that high rates of workplace illness and injury indicate the need to improve the management of hazards associated with… Read more »
Command versus technical authority: lessons from the 2nd General Health Battalion
MC Reade, C Flint, S Kennaway, N Duff, B McCall Introduction Historically, military medical units were commanded by senior doctors. All of the renowned hospitals that form the heritage of the ADF had medical commanders: for example, Colonel Thomas Henry Fiaschi of the 3rd Australian General Hospital at Lemnos; Lieutenant Colonel Wilfred Giblin of the… Read more »
Occupational and environmental health in the ADF
Commander Neil Westphalen Introduction ADF personnel are arguably exposed to the most diverse range of occupational and environmental hazards of any Australian workforce. Controlling these hazards is complicated not only by the number, size and complexity of ADF workplaces but also by its workforce demographics. ADF workplace hazards significantly impact the physical and mental health of current and ex-serving personnel. High rates of preventable… Read more »
The Mosquito can be More Dangerous than the Mortar Round – The Obligations of Command
A. M. Smith, C. Hooper We must be prepared to meet malaria by training as strict and earnest as that against enemy troops. We must be as practiced in our weapons against it as we are with a rifle. FIELD MARSHAL VISCOUNT SIR ARCHIBALD WAVELL These words, penned in 1943 by the commander in chief… Read more »
THE “TRIANGLE OF DEATH” Medical Sustainability in Expeditionary Sea-Based Operations
Reprinted with permission of the Naval War College Review Captain Smith, a frequent contributor to the Naval War College Review, is adjunct professor in both the Department of Surgery and the Department of Military and Emergency Medicine at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Maryland. He is also professor of surgery… Read more »
The Legacy of the Anaesthesia ‘Events’ at Pearl Harbor, 7th December 1941.
Reprinted from: Crowhurst J. The historical significance of anaesthesia events at Pearl Harbor. Anaesthesia and intensive care. 2014 Jul;42:21-4. Crowhurst JA. The Legacy of the Anaesthesia ‘Events’ at Pearl Harbor, 7th December 1941. Proceedings of the History of Anaesthesia Society. 2015; 48:85-95. Note: This paper is an expanded version of a lecture first presented at a… Read more »
Naval casualty management training using human patient simulators
This paper presents the SUCCeSS (Shipboard & Underwater Casualty Care & Sedation Simulation) program conducted by the Haifa Naval Base Medical Department with the support of the Maritime Medicine Branch of the Israeli Navy and the Trauma Instruction Section of the Israeli Defense Forces Medical Academy. The program began in 2011, undertaking to train naval trauma teams in Naval Casualty Management (NCM) on… Read more »
Australian Doctors at War. A literature review. Part Two: After Gallipoli
Introduction After the evacuation of Gallipoli, the AIF was reorganised in Egypt, and divided in two. The larger part, I Anzac Corps, under the Australian General Birdwood, was moved to France in March 1916. The smaller part, comprising II Anzac Corps, under the New Zealander General Godley, and later including the famous Anzac Mounted Division under General Chauvel, remained to protect Egypt,… Read more »
New Zealand Mobile Dental Section in Korea (II) (December 1952 – November 1954)
Reprinted from History of the South Korean Army Dental Corps, p. 386-389 In September 1952, Lieutenant Colin J. Wilson volunteered to replace Captain Alan H. Cull who had spent two years in Korea and was due for replacement. Lieutenant Wilson travelled to Korea via Japan in December 1952 and took command of the NZ Mobile… Read more »
New Zealand Mobile Dental Section in Korea(I) December 1950-January 1953)
Reprinted from History of the South Koran Army Dental Corps p. 376-385 In 1950, when the security Council of UNO asked member nations to provide forces for service in Korea, the New Zealand (NZ) Government announced it would recruit about one thousand men. The main component of the force was a field artillery regiment equipped… Read more »
Sometimes you hear the bullet
A Leavy Reprinted from: Aust Mil Med 1998; 7(1): 21-23 The comedy/drama MASH, which concerned thelives of Ameriean army medical staff stationed just behind the front lines in the Korean War, was one of the most successful television programs of the 1970’s. During it’s eleven year history it presented an enormous range of issues from the essentials of… Read more »
The development of dengue vaccines and their military significance
Reprinted from Australian Military Medicine Volume 9(2): 71-73. Background of Dengue in the South West Pacific Region Dengue has become a world-wide disease with more than 100 million cases per year.1 It is the leading cause of arboviral infection in humans.2 The current global pandemic of dengue arose from the combination of ecological disruption… Read more »
Experiences of a Prisoner of a War: World War 2 in Germany
On 16 December 1943, I was sitting at the Navigator’s seat in a very noisy Lancaster bomber over Berlin when something occurred that changed the pattern of my life. We had just dropped 13,000 pounds of bombs… a 4,000 pound “cookie” plus incendiaries and we were stooging along at 163 mph (280 km/hr) taking infra-red… Read more »
Submarine escape and rescue: a brief history
Reprinted with the kind permission of the editors of the Seapower Centre – Australia The disaster which befell the Russian submarine Kursk in August 2000 caught the world’s attention and became a galvanising event in drawing renewed focus on submarine safety in the new century. Public empathy worldwide seemed to be driven by the belief… Read more »
Severe rapid -onset paralysis in a part-time soldier
Reprinted from Critical Care Resuscitations 2006 8: 120:122 with the kind permission of The Editor, Critical Care Resuscitation Abstract We report a case of severe rapid-onset paralysis in a 28-year-old previously healthy man, necessitating intubation and mechanical ventilation, after a presumed bite or sting. Despite no other systemic manifestations of envenoming, the paralysis rapidly responded… Read more »
Contribution to the Study of Shell Shock
Reprinted from The Lancet, Volume 185, Issue 4772, 13 Feb 1915, pp 316-330 This article is reproduced with the kind permission of the Editors of The Lancet. It is only available as a PDF download which can be downloaded within the full edition
2025 AMMA Conference
