[Ether and chloroform narcosis in the pages of Zagreb newspapers from 1847 to 1849]. / Eterska i kloroformska narkoza na stranicama zagrebackih listova u razdoblju od 1847. do 1849. godine.

Overviews of the development of anesthesiology in Croatia always emphasize that the first report on the employment of ether anesthesia was published on March 13, 1847, in the Zadar newspaper Gazzeta di Zara. In the world as well, daily newspapers played an important part in spreading the news about the discovery and first use of ether anesthesia. This fact stimulated us to do a systematic search through Zagreb press of that time. Agramer Zeitung (Zagrebacke novine), with its supplement Luna--Beiblatt zur Agramer politischen Zeitung, then Narodne novine and Sudslavische Zeitung (Slavenski jug), were examined for the period from 1846 to the beginning of 1849. Research was directed to give the following answers: when the first writings about discovery and surgery in ether and chloroform anesthesia appeared, which primary and secondary sources of information were used; who wrote them; what kind of attitudes and opinions were promoted, and whose; and finally, did Zagreb newspapers communicate or record the news about first employment of ether and chloroform anesthesia in surgery in Croatia. Research results reveal that Zagreb press had an important role in informing Croatian public about breakthroughs and first experiences in the use of ether and chloroform anesthesia in Europe, and that it contributed to their popularization and employment in our settings. From January 26, 1847, Zagreb papers began publishing first articles about surgeries in ether anesthesia, referring to successes achieved in England and Scotland, and later in Vienna, Berlin, Prague and other big European towns. However, there were no reviews on first successes in America. Sources of information were mainly foreign daily papers, mostly Austrian, and much less often European professional medical journals. Zagreb papers did not report on first surgeries performed in Zadar, Dubrovnik and Split during 1847. The only news from the country referred to the procedure performed in August 1847 in Sisak. This is the first known published information about the beginnings of ether anesthesia in northwest Croatia. The article was written by an A. C., who witnessed and described first experiments using ether anesthesia in a Vienna clinic. Compared to the number of writings on ether anesthesia, introduction of chloroform received much less attention. The first news on Simpson's success was published on December 11, 1847. Regarding total number of texts dedicated to the topic of painless surgery, culmination was reached in 1847, and afterwards the interest of press in this field decreased. In the period from 1847 to the beginning of 1849, not one article was followed by subsequent comments of Croatian readers, either lay people or medical practitioners. Texts were not written sensationally, but with the aim to objectively inform the public by communicating experience and attitudes of contemporary reputable surgeons, including all professional details which might be useful for potential users--patients, as well as for Croatian physicians, surgeons, obstetricians, dentists and veterinarians.

Public health reforms and development of health service in the Dakovo sub-district and administrative county in the period 1850-1899.

In the long-lasting struggle for national identity and modernization of Croatia, the Parliament of the Kingdom of Croatia and Slavonia has passed many laws and regulations from 1874 on, affecting thus the health care and the development of the public health system. The aim of those laws was to establish and achieve the same level of public health care that had already been instituted in some other countries of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. In order to clarify the consequences of these reforms for the development of the health care system on the county and district levels of Slavonia, we collected data on the town of Dakovo as a market center, home of the diocese, and seat of the sub-district and administrative county. The data were divided into several categories in order to examine (1) the reorganization of health care in the Kingdom of Croatia and Slavonia from 1848 to 1894; (2) the development of health care in the Dakovo sub-district and Dakovo administrative county; (3) number, structure, and distribution of medical practitioners from 1807 to 1899; (4) hospitals from 1859 to 1900; and (5) selected indicators of health and living condition and health needs of the county inhabitants in the period 1850-1900. The analysis of historical material showed that new regulations of health care initiated the process of "medicalization" that was understood as a part of European modernization in the field of state medicine and health care administration. It brought more accurate knowledge of the main causes of illnesses, deaths and disabilities but did not significantly improve health and health conditions in the Dakovo County at the entrance of the 20th century.

[Role and contribution of the Croatian Medical Association in the founding of the pathoanatomic service of the public health divisions in the city of Zagreb in 1913]. / Uloga i doprinos hrvatskoga lijecnickog zbora u osnivanju prosekture javnih zdravstvenih zavoda grada Zagreba g. 1913.

Decision on the founding of the pathoanatomic service of the public health divisions, and the appointment of Dr. Ljudevit Jurak for the first prosector in 1913, is considered the beginning of the organized development of pathologic anatomy in Croatia. The aim of this paper was to investigate why this decision was made only in 1913, i.e. to find so far unknown answers to the questions who, when and with which motives made the initiative to found this important institution. Results and conclusions presented are based mainly on the data gathered by searching through "Lijecnicki vjesnik" from 1877 through 1914, complemented with information from the available archives, as well as the facts published in newspapers and historical medical contributions. The conducted research indicates that at the beginning of the twentieth century the need for public pathoanatomic service and prosector in the city of Zagreb most strongly imposed itself in the setting of clinical practice, first of all hospitals, and demands in medical jurisprudence, and much less as the result of administrative regulations on gathering statistics on death causes introduced in the kingdom of Croatia and Slavonia at the end of the nineteenth century. The Medical Association of the kingdom of Croatia and Slavonia indisputably had the most important role in the founding of the organized pathoanatomic service in the city of Zagreb, and also in the development of pathologic anatomy in Croatia. The filed requests which the Medical Association sent to the government and published in "Lijecnicki vjesnik" from 1903 to 1911 reveal that the positions of the physicians regarding the importance of pathologic anatomy for the development of modern pathoanatomic and bacteriologic diagnostics, for the investigation of the causes of death including the violent death, as well as for the development of scientific research in Croatia, were in accordance with the most advanced notions of their colleagues in Europe. The history of the struggle to found the public pathoanatomic service in Zagreb highlights the endeavors and need of Croatian physicians to update the routine professional, public health and scientific work. At the same time these were related with their striving to found clinical bases and scientific divisions necessary for the establishment of the medical school in Zagreb. The work of prosector and pathoanatomic service is being considered in the function of teaching pathological anatomy at the medical school in Zagreb, as well as in the function of teaching medical jurisprudence at the level of the University of Zagreb, i.e. the existent Law School and the future medical school. Difficulties in the realization of these endeavors can partly be explained by the lack of understanding and interest on the part of administrative and political authorities. However, one of the possible reasons for the delay of the decision on founding pathoanatomic service in the city of Zagreb till 1913 may be the fact that among Croatian physicians until 1911 there were no experts in pathologic anatomy who might have satisfied the requirements, although in that period there were no obstacles for such service in Zagreb to be entrusted to any professional, citizen of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. All taken into account, Dr, Ljudevit Jurak (1881-1945) was the only Croat who in the period from 1911 to 1913, when he was elected the prosector of the public pathoanatomic service in the city of Zagreb, met high requirements for the professional, scientific and research work, as well as for teaching in the field of pathologic anatomy and medical jurisprudence at the university.

[Facing new ethical challenges and dilemmas]. / U susret novim etickim izazovima i dilemama.

Considering the present health policy, health service and health care systems, health condition and health demands of the people, proclaimed priorities in biomedical scientific research in the Republic of Croatia, and expected health and disease status in the first decades of the 21st century, the author raises the question of sensitization of the Croatian physicians and the public to new ethical challenges. These questions are arousing attention in the world and Europe as one of the peculiarities mankind is facing in the midst of new scientific, technical and informatic possibilities, at the same time in the context of global impoverishment and restricted public funds, with existing or expected changes in the demographic structure and the life philosophy system of values. In democratic, pluralistic societies, the dimension of human rights is getting increasingly pronounced. This is reflected in the postulation of international, national or professional bioethical standards related to biomedical research, in the emphasis on the indisputable public right to actively make decisions by consensus mechanisms about goals, priorities and limits of individual and collective health care programmes, forms and levels of medical care in the national health service and obligatory health insurance system, as well as about ethical aspects of the relation doctor-patient, at the boundary of the interactions of doctor-patient-profession-individual-community-society relationships.

A brief review of Croatian medical history until the 19 century--Part 1.

The purpose of this study is to remind the contemporary readers of the role and contribution of Croatian medical heritage in the development of medicine in Europe and the World, as well as of the development of medical concepts and medical practice on the territory of what is Croatia today. Selected examples are presented of the famous events and notable persons from the ancient time until the middle of the 19th century.

[The work of Dr. Lavoslav Glesinger in the history of medicine (1901-1986)]. / Povijesnomedicinski rad prof. dr. sc. Lavoslava Glesingera (1901-1986).

In this paper special attention has been given to the analysis of the elements of the life and work of Professor Lavoslav Glesinger, M.D.,Ph.D., being at the same time the indicators of his role in the process of the development and recognition of the history of medicine as a profession and scientific, educational and academic discipline in our environment. With regard to the assigned object, all available bibliographic material has been studied. Professor Glesinger, being a physician practitioner, showed the interest in that field even in the period from 1931 to 1948 and wholly devoted himself to it working as a professional researcher and professor at the School of Medicine, University of Zagreb in the period from 1948 to 1976, and as a scientist at the Institute for History of Science, Mathematics and Medicine of the Yugoslav Academy of Arts and Sciences, Zagreb, in the period from 1960 to 1981.