World War I and Modern Medicine

At the turn of the 20th Century, many in the West were quite confident that they were living in the most civilized era in history. Progress had at last won out over barbarism – or so it seemed. Then the battlefields of World War I quickly proved a charnel house – challenging not just the belief in man’s progress, but the limits of modern medicine. And yet, the horrors of the battlefield prompted a wave of medical innovations that form the basis of modern medicine today. To discuss this evolution in medicine, the World War I podcast interviewed Dr. Thomas Helling, a Professor of Surgery and head of General Surgery at the University of Mississippi in Jackson. He is an expert on military medicine, trauma and critical care, and the author of The Great War and the Birth of Modern Medicine. 

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