The frontline shifted so swiftly during the Great Patriotic War that evacuating casualties rearwards often turned to be impossible. So, the necessary field medical care was delivered in mobile surgical hospitals. Being autonomous, they differed in important ways from any other military medical establishments. In case of emergency they could scale down work within a matter of hours and follow on the unit they were attached to. The number of the mobile surgical hospital pointed out its affiliation with a unit.
During the Battle of Kursk, several mobile surgical hospitals delivered field medical care to the wounded servicemen. For instance, on July 12, 1943, a camp site of mobile surgical hospital No. 5160 which was part of advanced field casualty clearing station No. 232 attached to the Fifth Guards Tank Army, was laid out. The enlisted personnel included 12 men, among them 4 drivers, a cook, 3 enrolled nurses, 4 medical aidmen. The mobile medical group was fully maintained by the Army, but still it had trucks of its own, which conveyed the wounded during military operations, if it turned to be impossible to evacuate them rearwards.
Guards Major of medical service Ivan Vyacheslavovich Sholkovsky was commanding officer of the mobile surgical hospital appointed in March, 1943. The hospital itself had been organized in Ukraine and then transferred to Kursk. According to his personal reference, Sholkovsky was not just master of medical profession (the surgeon was awarded the title Honored Doctor of Moldavia before the war) but also a gifted manager.
The service at the hospital was organized in such a way that it could receive wounded patients and operate on them around-the-clock. Meanwhile it was not uncommon that, for the sake of time-saving, surgery was in progress in one tent and the other one was already being dismantled and loaded on trucks along with the wounded, to shift the location.
It is worthy of note that Ivan Sholkovsky could have been invalided out of the army as early as during the early part of the war because of ill health, but he had refused to abandon the fighting front. Over a period of two and a half years right from the word go, his personnel managed to give high-skilled medical aid to almost 4,000 tank soldiers of the Fifth Army.
His right hand was the enrolled nurse of mobile surgical hospital No. 5160, Warrant Officer of medical service Irina Nikolayevna Frango.
During the Battle of Kursk, several mobile surgical hospitals delivered field medical care to the wounded servicemen. For instance, on July 12, 1943, a camp site of mobile surgical hospital No. 5160 which was part of advanced field casualty clearing station No. 232 attached to the Fifth Guards Tank Army, was laid out. The enlisted personnel included 12 men, among them 4 drivers, a cook, 3 enrolled nurses, 4 medical aidmen. The mobile medical group was fully maintained by the Army, but still it had trucks of its own, which conveyed the wounded during military operations, if it turned to be impossible to evacuate them rearwards.
Guards Major of medical service Ivan Vyacheslavovich Sholkovsky was commanding officer of the mobile surgical hospital appointed in March, 1943. The hospital itself had been organized in Ukraine and then transferred to Kursk. According to his personal reference, Sholkovsky was not just master of medical profession (the surgeon was awarded the title Honored Doctor of Moldavia before the war) but also a gifted manager.
The service at the hospital was organized in such a way that it could receive wounded patients and operate on them around-the-clock. Meanwhile it was not uncommon that, for the sake of time-saving, surgery was in progress in one tent and the other one was already being dismantled and loaded on trucks along with the wounded, to shift the location.
It is worthy of note that Ivan Sholkovsky could have been invalided out of the army as early as during the early part of the war because of ill health, but he had refused to abandon the fighting front. Over a period of two and a half years right from the word go, his personnel managed to give high-skilled medical aid to almost 4,000 tank soldiers of the Fifth Army.
His right hand was the enrolled nurse of mobile surgical hospital No. 5160, Warrant Officer of medical service Irina Nikolayevna Frango.
