IN OUR communIty
How civilians have benefited from battlefield medical care BY JIM HOWE
MANY ADVANCES IN MEDICINE have come from the military, where medical teams seek new ways to help wounded warriors, from the battlefield to the operating room to the research laboratory. Wartime necessity spurred the expanded use of tourniquets, penicillin and many practices in modern emergency care. Some of these improvements were outlined by Patrick Basile, MD, in a fall 2018 lecture at Upstate, where he was honored with the Outstanding Young Alumnus award. Basile, a 2003 graduate of Upstate’s College of Medicine, cared for the wounded while serving in the Navy. He took part in the first double arm transplant at Johns Hopkins and also participated in U.S. military missions abroad to repair cle� lips and other deformities. He currently practices plastic and reconstructive surgery in Florida. Basile worked at what is now called the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, in Bethesda, Md., the largest military medical center in the world, where he saw many blast injuries from the Iraq War. Among the innovations he noted: Penicillin: Today, antibiotics are taken for granted, but less than a century ago, war wounds could easily become infected and deadly. Penicillin, one of the first antibiotic drugs, existed chiefly in research labs before World War II. A crash Anglo-American program during the war led to wide use of the drug and greatly improved combat survival rates. Sulfa drugs, which also fought infections, were available to the public shortly before WWII but also saw widely expanded use in that war and were even carried into battle in first-aid kits. Penicillin and sulfa drugs have been widely available to the general public since continued on page 23
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U P S TAT E H E A LT H
upstate.edu l winter 2019
