The Hospital in Slavonski Brod from 1918 to 1957

Abstract

The paper describes the development of the hospital from the end of World War I to the unification of the hospital and outpatient healthcare into a single institution called the Health Centre. In that forty-year period, three social systems (countries) changed and World War II happened. By the end of World War I the hospital had 84 beds with additional capacities of 10 beds in the pavilion for contagious diseases and 27 more in the barracks.  In total, there were around 20 employees, out of which two doctors and seven nurses. Beside the civilian hospital, there was also a military hospital in Brod fortress that remained open until the end of World War II. At the moment the Health Centre was formed in 1957 there were 350 employees, out of which 36 doctors (8 practised general medicine), 21 nurses and 53 technicians.  The hospital’s capacity was 452 beds. The city of Slavonski Brod had around 10,000 inhabitants in 1919, and the number grew to 30,000 by 1957. The Health Centre, later the Medical Centre of Slavonski Brod was the first healthcare organization of its kind in the entire former Yugoslavia.  Few years after Slavonski Brod, such an organization was adopted by all the cities with hospitals except the major cities.  In Croatia, only Zagreb, Osijek, Rijeka and Split did not have such medical centres. The article was written using all available published literature about this period of the development of the hospital, and also the healthcare documentation preserved at the State Archives in Slavonski Brod.