The medical staff at first was quite inadequate for the work of visiting all these sick. The two Turkish doctors and the two pharmacists found the life too strenuous for much more than half a day’s work at a time. It was several days before we were able to do more than make sure that the very sick were seen by a doctor each day.
There was also a shortage of drugs. The remedies needed were few and simple, but they were needed in large quantities. This lack was soon supplied from the drug shops in Mersine. There was a shortage of bottles to put fluid medicines in, and medicines when not taken on the spot were dispensed in finjans, old tin cups, or anything that would hold fluids. One man at the dispensary, whose prescription for castor oil had been filled, in spite of protestations, into his own mouth, when he was told to go finally made clear that it was for his wife that he wanted the medicine.
Conditions Improve.
These rough and ready methods gradually passed as better organization became possible. Dr. Peoples, newly arrived for American mission work in Mersine, joined the medical staff in Adana on May 9, and gave valuable assistance in various branches of the work. After a week, on May 12, the returning French Sisters of Charity, among whom were two experienced nurses, opened a pharmacy and clinic for the refugees of the German camp.
On Sunday, May 16, an Armenian delegation, sent by the Armenians of Constantinople, consisting of three senior medical students, one doctor, and two pharmacists, opened a well-equipped pharmacy, which they had brought with them, in the Yenemahalle camp.
In the meantime the conditions of hospital work became greatly improved. On May 8, three days after our arrival, the surgical hospital of Mrs. Doughty-Wylie was moved from the little cottage and railroad sheds, where such excellent emergency work had been done under such adverse circumstances, to a large commodious house, which had been generously offered for the work by its owner, Cosma Simeonides. In the well-ventilated, spacious rooms of this building 60 patients were comfortably housed, and sufficient space was left for an admirable operating room, for accommodations for help, and for kitchen needs. To care for the patients in these improved quarters, and to relieve the work of the British marines, the necessity for whose withdrawal was anticipated in the near future, a corps of 15 young Armenians and Greeks were enrolled as hospital assistants. These volunteers were for the most part students of St. Paul’s Institute, at Tarsus, and their knowledge of English facilitated the work for the English speaking doctors and nurses. Under these new conditions work which before was arduous and imperfect became a constant source of satisfaction and pleasure. A large debt of gratitude is due to the owners who so generously devoted their beautiful home to this work.
The transfer of the surgical patients left the first emergency hospital free for the accommodation of medical patients. It was soon filled and overflowing, and within a week it was found necessary to accept an offer of the use of the Greek School for the accommodation of patients. On Saturday, May 15, this building was opened as a medical hospital with 50 patients, the most part cases of pneumonia, enteric fever, and dysentery. These patients, too, were under the general care and oversight of Mrs. Doughty-Wylie. In this building also were housed the four American first-aid bluejackets who came up from the cruiser North Carolina the following week; and here, too, was instituted another pharmacy to supply the needs of the hospitals under the care of the sailors who had had training in pharmaceutical work.
Work of Trained Nurses.
In connection with the improvement of the hospital work should be mentioned the noble work of several trained nurses, whose services were early volunteered. Miss Yerghanian, sent by the King’s Daughters Society of Smyrna for this work, arrived on May 5. Miss La Fontaine, of the British Seaman’s Hospital at Smyrna, came soon after. These two, in conjunction with two Armenian nurses who came with the Constantinople Armenian Relief Commission, undertook the nursing of the medical hospital. Miss Davis, of the Jessie Taylor Memorial School, of Beirut, furnished Mrs. Doughty-Wylie most acceptable and skillful assistance in the work at the surgical hospital.