The Kansas City sun. (Kansas City, Mo.) 1908-1924, 1918-09-14
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~- perience of, the allies and the
central powers, studied at first hand by a corps
of specialists, and supplemented by cooperative
research under the direction of the Red Cross
Institute for Crippled and Disabled Men, and the
National Association of Manufacturers, a pro-
gramme has been worked out by the surgeon gen.
erals office of the army which is calculated to
insure to every soldier of the United States who
comes back from lover there" minus an arm or
n leg, blind, deaf, OF otherwise handicapped, a
better chance of reinstatement as q useful mem
Der of society than was afforded to any of the
soldiers of the allies in the first two or three
years of the war.
Germany alone, the only nation that was pre-
pared for this war, had included detailed plans
for the reconstruction of MANNED and mutilated
soldiers in it's war program from the beginning,
and, under its autocratic system of government,
has been able to enforce these plans, with the
result that every crippled German soldier is put
to work at some useful occupation with the slight
est possible delay after his injury. The allies
have had to evolve their general plans as well
as particular methods out of the bitter experience
of war, in this as in other phases of the great
conflict, writes Frank Parker Stockbridge in New
York Times.
1t was not until after the United States en-
tered the warm May, 1917, to be exact-that
there was anything like a complete exchange of
experiences and principles evolved from them In
respect to the war cripple. Out of the first inter-
allied conference on reconstruction and re-educa-
tion of the disabled combatant, held in Paris May
8 TO II, 1917, at which delegates from the United
States surgeon generals office sat for the first
time us representatives of their nation at war,
cam an international interchange of knowledge
and ideas concerning the war cripple. AT a sec
ond conference, held in London last November, q
permanent interallied committee was established
which will have its headquarters in a new per-
manent institute for the disabled. endowed by
the French government with 10000 francs $780,
000) for buildinp and pouinmpnt and maintained
by annual appropriations of 10000 francs ($6,OOO)
each by the different allied nations represented.
Already this clearing house of scientific and
economic information for the benefit of the war
cripple has done invaluable work in enabling the
warning nations to profit by each others expert
ences and mistakes. Not the least valuable con-
tributions have come from American sources, our
army surgeons having had opportunities for COM
parative observation of methods in vogue in diff
ferent countries denied to those whose nations
had been actually at war for three years. The
United States, therefore, will begin its work of
restoration with the accumulated experience Of
nearly four years to build upon.
The first steps toward reinstatement to q self
supporting status, and by far the most important
steps, must be begun almost Immediately after
the soldier receives the incapacitating injury
and carried on continuously and cumulatively
throughout the period of his hospital care.
This is especially true in the case of the SOL
der who has lost a limb, or who has been blinded.
One of the most important lessons gained from
the experience of the allies, IL not the most i'm
portant, is that the problem of the restoration to
usefulness of the crippled soldier Is a psyche
logical one, even more than it is surgical or
economic. The experience of the French authori-
ties, who had to deal with a terrific proportion of
mutiles in the first two years of the war, was
disheartening. Fewer than II per cent of dis
a0led soldiers expressed a desire or even willing
ness to learn how to do useful work. A large
prOnortion ho1 Glnct thair parXrap OF tho Same
time that they lost their limbs or their eyesight.
most of them felt that they had done enough for
their country-that the nation owed them their
living without effort. Because facilities for the
early employment of patients, even at trivial oc-
equations, were lacking in the military hospitals,
they lad acquired the habit of ldleness which.
when once fixed, is almost ineradicable.
The experience of france differed only in de-
gree from that of the other allied nations. To
avoid a similar experience, and not only give
every crippled soldier the best possible chance
to become self-supporting, but to insure that he
avails himself of the opportunity thus afforded,
the psychological and economic rehabilitation of
every American incapacitated by his Injuries for
further military service Will begin with and go
on parallel with his physical rehabilitation,
which, in turn, will be a process not merely of
patching up but of the actual development to
their utmost usefulness of all the injured mans
remaining physical powers.
The first reaction of the man who has lost a
limb is utter despair. He is "done for" In his
own estimation. Nobody has any use for a Grip
pie" rs the way in which nine out OF ten express
II. Unless he is a man whose former occupa-
lion has been mental, not dependent upon the
use OF his physical energies, he sees no ray or
hope for his own future. Unless Immediately
rectifed, this state of mind quickly becomes fixed
and all but irremediable. SO the first step to-
ward rehabilitation, which will begin almost as
soon as the injured man comes out from under
the anesthetic, Is what they are terming In the
surgeon generals Office "cheer-up work" By
every means that can be devised the cripple Is to
he convinced that his case is not hopeless, that