Tensas gazette. [volume] (St. Joseph, La.) 1886-current, 1918-06-28

Douglas F. Duval, in command of the hospital.
Colonel Duval has as members of his staff many
physicians from private life who have given up
their practices to take service with the army.
In round numbers the hospital is now able to
afford LOO beds for patients. If it is enlarged.
as is contemplated, there will be provision for
caring for 5000 men. These men come from all
the camps fsom Long Island to Norfolk Va, as
well as from overseas
They suffer from great variety of illnesses
which are discovered during n last examination in
camp before they sent to the other side.
Then they are transferred to the Gun Hill Road
hospital either for treatment or for examination
for discharge. The hospital is fully equipped and
can give defintive treatment of every sort if
necessary. But as it stands at the point of en-
barkation, and at the point of debarkatiOn as
well. as the war progresses it is supposed that it
will more and more be used as clearing house.
There 40 wards in the hospital altogether.
The number devoted to surgical is usually
so far nine ten, including nose and throat
cases. The wounded men from the other side
still too few to constitute an important feature
of the surgical work. More than half of the
surgical cases up to the present are due to nose
and throat troubles, many of which have existed
for a long time and have been exaggerated by life
in camp during the very cold winter. There is
a psychOpathic ward and hydrologic ward, some
times more than of each of these The rest
of the wards are for medical cases. The variety
of these is great as in civil life. There are
many heart cases. These include men who
have of course had some heart affection before
entering the army. This has been augmented I'M
der the strain of army training.
"They have slipped in through dozen differ
ent channels" explained the officer of the day
who accompanied upon the rounds of the
hospital. Sometimes, for instance, boy has got
in through the good offices of the village doctor
whom he has known all his life. The physician
wanted to do the boy good turn and has been
Oversanguine about his holding up under the in
creased strain of army life. A boy who really
wants to go to war is sometimes able to over
persuade physician who really doesn't mean to
fail in conscientiOuSness. Then, too, there are
many cases which would get along well enough
in civil life. and physician may be honestly con-
WINGED that the trouble is unmpOrtant. But some
where along the line the boy breaks down. il
may not be until he gets to Camp Merritt and is
about to be shipped out in day or two Per
haps 1t will not be until he gets on the other
side. There is n great effort on the part of the
army to weed them out before they get across
but it hasn't always been accomplished"
When stepped into a typical ward and
looked around us wished that 1t might be pOssi-
BILE for the army to give public demonstration
Of a United States military hospital One usual
ly thinks Of such place as rather dOOrOus but
United States Army Hospital No. 1 is one of the
most cheerful places in New York city. Perhaps
1t is because the buildings new wooden ones,
so much less ponderOus than those of other hos
pitfalls, that Hospital No. 1 seems to bid one to
take courage and look the brighter side Of
life. Only youth and hope have been sheltered