I know it's over 61 years since World War II ended, but one still must exercize a certain degree of sensitivity to the fact that we are an American Army still inhabiting German soil. We occupy large parts of this country, even though we are no longer an Army of Occupation. Just between here and nearby Heidelburg are dozens of Army and Air Force Bases, Caserns, Barracks, Clinics, Depots, Commands and Headquarters, a pattern repeated all over ...

Salzburg, Austria, lies just over the border beyond Munich, only four trains and five hours from here. They speak German there, too, so it made great sense to head toward the southeast this last weekend -- no new foreign phrase book to carry around, just the same old dog-eared German one that I refer to increasingly less and less. It had snowed in Austria on Thursday, and the dirty remnants of that first Neuschnee were still forcing pedestrians ...

All hospital patients should have visitors. Most do, usually family and friends. Strangers usually come around the High Holidays, spreading good cheer anonymously by doling out seasonal songs or baskets of goodies. Pediatric wards, especially, are full of carolers, and other groups of people -- auxiliaries of local police and fire houses, or fraternal organizations -- passing out stuffed animals. But at least at this military hospital it's ...

The hospital is practically empty today, the start of a four-day weekend occasioned by Columbus Day falling on Monday. Empty of ancillary staff and non-essential personnel, that is, but certainly not of patients. I started the day with only one patient in-house, a man whose kidney I removed on Monday last, and made arrangements ...

Tradition has it that general surgeons are the "captain of the ship" when it comes to coordinating care for trauma patients, especially when more than one organ system is involved. Unfortunately for many of the patients here at Landstuhl, their injuries are protean, and so there are many "captains" here, and many "ships" in need of one. As a urologists, I usually function in an advisory capacity for the general surgeons, or for the internists in ...

You should know who I spend my time with outside of work, the people I look for in the mess hall when it's crowded, and the people I share a rental car with on weekends. There're the same three who showed up at Ft. Benning when I did, and we travelled to Germany on the same plane. One is a lieutenant, a registered nurse anesthetist with whom I'll surely work in surgery. From St. Louis, the son of a CRNA too, he's relatively new to the Army, but ...

Landstuhl Hospital is unique among medical centers. It’s laid out in a far-flung succession of long wards and connecting hallways – a concept born out of a need to survive an aerial bombardment typical of wars fought long ago. The walking distance, say from the urology clinic to the emergency room, the operating room, the I.C.U. or the cafeteria, is vast, which may partly explain why everyone here looks so fit. The corridors are crowded with ...

A few kilometers from the American military cemetery in Luxembourg lies its German equivalent. Where the American cemetery is supported by tax dollars and a Government agency, the German one is cared for by volunteers. Much smaller in size, it contains the remains of nearly twice as many soldiers as the American one, because ...

Two other medical folk who travelled over here to Germany with me last week, a radiologist from Wichita, Kansas and a nurse anesthetist from St. Louis, drove with me this morning to the large American cemetery outside Luxembourg City. This was my first visit to a national cemetery outside the United States. Over 5000 graves lie here, each marked by a white granite cross or Star of David. We chose this one because it is also the final resting ...

Yesterday I took three local trains through the German countryside to a quaint little village, Bad Durkheim, that was celebrating the local wine industry. Viticulture has been a principal industry of this part of Germany for a very long time, because this is the 600th-plus time the annual Fall Festival has come around. I'm impressed by that because nothing in America is even close to being that old, if you don't count the oldest cemeteries on Long ...