Do you agree that organisation was the main reason for the poor standard of medical care offered to British troops in the Crimea?

by jonzilla182 (student)

In essence I believe that because of the dreadful organisation, and the way that the commanders of the army in the Crimean war dealt with the organisation, this was the main contributing factor for the way the British troops were treated in hospitals and medically through out the duration of the Crimean war. Had there been a better organisation, more medical equipment and more trained professionals in the Crimea then the standard of medical care that the troops received would have been better, meaning that organisation was one of the main reasons for the thousands of unnecessary deaths and poor standard of medical conditions offered to the British troops during the Crimean war, as it results

Source I clearly backs up the idea that it was the people in charge and their lack of organisational skills that results in the appalling medical conditions of the Crimean war. Phrases like ‘the man who conceived the idea that the hard work of a military hospital could be performed by worn out and ages cripples must have slight knowledge’ show that it was the people who were in charge of organisations fault that the medial services offered in the Crimea were of very poor standard. Poor organisation again resulted in far too few medically trained staff coming to the Crimea, this meant that the staff that were out there were constantly ran off their feet and meant that on many occasions patient could not been seen too, this was began Lord Raglan decided against providing enough ship space to take qualified medics out to the Crimea. Furthermore poor organisation also resulted in a lack of equipment, there was not enough blankets for example which lead to more deaths in hospitals around the Crimea, as the poor organisation from the leaders meant that necessary thing did not arrive in the right hospitals at the right times. This also contributed to why poor organisation was the main reason for the bad standard of medical care available for the troops.

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However, Source J does not agree fully with the idea that it was the problem of the organisation that lead to such difficulties in Crimea, it contradicts the statement made on organisation by implying that Britain did not have the right equipment to provide substantial medical care for its troops in the Crimea, rather than implying that it was the disorganisation of the medical equipment they did have. It can also be argued that other factors, like the poor weather, which did not allow vital equipment to be delivered to places on time and general lack of sanitation during that era which were more heavily to blame for the awful standards of medical care for British troops, and that the fact that the medical services were not organised greatly just made the problem slightly worse, and was not actually the overarching factor for the poor standards. Another aspect that affected the standards of the medical conditions was because some supplies never actually made it to the Crimea, they were lost in ships at sea and this made the war a lot harder and meant there were not as many supplies, so medical services could not be as good as they could have been, another way that it can be argues that it was not the organisation but a host of other factors that when all linked in with each other resulted in very poor medical services.

Even though it can be argued that there were other factors to the poor medical services in the Crimea, and it is undoubted that it was not only the organisation that lead to these poor services, I think that the poor organisation of the medical services was the main reason for the dread medical care that the British troops received, because all the men in command valued military might and spectacle over organising and providing proper medical services, it resulted in a lot of deaths across the Crimea. Equipment was not sent to the right places and contingency plans were not put in place in case of things like poor weather or loosing equipment out at see, had this been done, which would have been the proper organisation, the medical services would not have been anywhere near as bad, showing agree that it was the poor organisation that resulted in the poor condition the British had to suffer when in the Crimea.

Do you agree that organisation was the main reason for the poor standard of medical care offered to British troops in the Crimea?

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