Civil War medicine was not very effective at all. In factmore people died from disease than actual fighting. Thedoctors during that time could not cure much for people whobecame sick.
The North had a small advantage over the South when it cameto medical technology, but only slightly. They were bothequally bad.
Medicine given to patients was so poor that it usuallycaused more problems for them than actually helping them.Soldiers did everything they could to keep themselveshealthy because they knew getting sick or wounded would bevirtually a death sentence.
There were a lot of bad treatments going around during theCivil War. One in particular was Mercury. This was seen assomewhat of a cure all and it was given to patients forvirtually any problem they had. The reason this medicine wasbad simply was because it was poisonous to people. It isknown to cause brain damage, tooth loss, and digestiveproblems.
Of course not every was horrible. Civil War medicine such aschloroform was actually very helpful to people. It wasnothing more than an anesthetic but it allowed surgeons toput their patients to sleep while they operated on them. Italso allowed patients to be operated on without having to gothrough the painful agony of the operation. Mercury wasplentiful on both sides during the war.
The primary tool of the surgeon was the bone saw. I thinkit's pretty easy to imagine what this little piece oftechnology did for people. It sawed bones. If a soldier wasshot in an arm or leg that usually meant bone saw time.
There was a simple reason why there were so many amputationsduring the war. Infection would usually sent in soon after asoldier was wounded, the only way to prevent this fromhappening was to amputate.
The majority of all battlefield surgeries during the warwere amputations.
You can find detailed facts regarding CivilWar Medicine plus any other topic regarding the CivilWar here.
Source: www.articlecity.com
