Army Dental Corps

ARMY AND NAVY. the medical officers. Secretary Baker is said to concur in this view. As a general rule every one would sub­ scribe to the principle that the higher commissions ought not to be awarded to men outside the fighting service. But in the case of medical officers a very special exception must be made. If the war department declines to make that exception, its attitude can be explained only as an inheritance of an antiquated military tradition. It is hardly necessary to observe that the health of an army is one of the most potent factors in its success. It is like­ wise quite clear that the sooner wound­ ed men can be made fit again, the strong­ er the battle line. The Germans have not bombarded hospitals merely fo r the pleasure of killing wounded men; they have done so to prevent these men from taking their places in the trenches again. Their purpose is still further served if they succeed in killing medical officers. Anything that impairs the medical ser­ vice impairs the efficiency of the army. Surgeon General Gorgas says the effi­ ciency of the medical service cannot be raised to the highest level under present conditions. His contention is fully sus­ tained by our own past experience and that of other nations. It is a matter of record that army officials have often dis­ regarded the warnings and advice of army surgeons, not because of military necessity, but because of negligence, in­ attention, or worse. The medical officer, more often than not, was a nuisance un­ til the men were on the point of death. During the Spanish-Amerlcan war the recommendations of the army surgeons were repeatedly ignored, with the result that thousands of men died from disease to every one that died from wounds. The Bristish commissions that investigated the Mesopotamia fiasco attributed that failure in a large measure to a similar disregard of medical considerations. In the Spanish-American war and in the Mesopotamia campaign the medical officers were handicapped by their infe­

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rior rank. Their recommendations failed to carry weight because their rank car­ ried little authority. A general officer felt perfectly free to ignore the advice o f men in distinctly subordinate posi­ tions, even if these men were distin­ guished physicians and surgeons. The British have learned their lesson. The rank of British medical officers now is practically on a parity with the rank o f officers in military service. The French have the same system. American medi­ cal officers in France suffer not only from the initial disability of inferior rank but also from the unjust and per­ haps humiliating sense of inferiority that inevitably rises in their association with the British and French. Dr. Mayo put the case succinctly when he said that over there they looked at the uniform and not the man inside the clothes, adding that the man could get any further than the clothes he wore en­ titled him to get, no matter how great his reputation at home. For the protection of our soldiers, if for no other reason, the Omen bill ought to pass.— Editorial, Chicago Tribune, March 2 5 . ARMY DENTAL, CORPS. Under a recent decision of the W ar Department the dental corps of the Reg­ ular Army is entitled to about 300 offi­ cers, or about 90’ more than it now has. Recently some 200 candidates for the appointment to this corps were exam­ ined, but the marking of the papers has not been completed. It is expected that a sufficient number will be found quali­ fied to fill the vacancies. The national defense act of June 3, 1916, fixed the strength of the dental corps on the basis of one for every thousand of enlisted men of the line of the Army. This was amended by the act of October 6, 1917, which provides that there shall be one dental officer for every thousand o f the total strength of the Regular Army (com­ missioned and enlisted, line and staff) authorized from time to time by law, and

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THE JOURNAL, OF THE NATIONAL DENTAL ASSOCIATION.

that the dental corps shall consist of commissioned officers of the same grade and proportionately distributed among such grades as are now or may hereafter be provided by law for the medical corps. LETTER

FROM PATRIOTIC D ENTIST.

St. Paul, Minn., March 9, 1918. Dear Doctor K ing:— I am sending you a picture. Don’t you think this picture would interest the many readers of The Journal, especially at this time? This picture is one of myself taken in camp;

even during the night, to give relief to men suffering from tooth troubles, and I might add that only within the past year have I examined some of the fillings I put in during my service with the colors and have found them doing good service. Because of my age and because I have served my country once in the ranks, I have made application for a commission as Dental Surgeon in the Dental Reserve Corps. I am anxious to help the good old U. S. A. and I believe I am entitled to a commission. Yours respectfully, W. O. ASSEIN, 1045 Hastings Ave. SH OOT TH E S P IE S !

my chair is strictly home-made and my instrument case, you will note, is a cigar box. I enlisted as a private in the Spanish war in 1898 and served until mustered out, my salary being $15 to $18 per month. Practically all of my profes­ sional services while in the Army were “ thank you” jobs. I furnished all mate­ rials and instruments but the forceps, extractions were always filled; on rare occasions, I would receive twenty-five cents for a particularly difficult filling. I was not in service long before it was known thruout our Army Corps that there was a dentist in the ranks and from that time on, I was frequently called upon,

The developments of the last two weeks have indicated that there is an in­ creasing number of spies and enemy agents engaged in active operations in various parts of this country. There have been revelations of the presence of these persons in many of the principal plants where are manufactured airplanes, shells, and other materials needed in Eu­ rope. It seems to be possible for men to get into the factories and do damage to the product. There has long been a sus­ picion that the industry of the Germans in that direction was persistent, skillful, and successful. The only consolation at present is that some of the offenders are being identified, if they are not being adequately punished. There would seem to be no good reason why the government should not execute, with as little delay and formality as is consistent with the regularities of such a transaction, those who have been convicted of such atroci­ ties as have been described recently in the newspapers. That process would re­ move effectually and permanently people who are materially aiding the enemy by secretly murderous methods, and would serve as a fine, and probably effective, example to those who are inclined to continue that class of work. An individual capable of such destruc-