MEDICAL STAFF OF THE KOREA MISSION DR. E. D. FOLLWELL DR. J. D. VAN BUSKIRK DR. A. H. NORTON DR. I. M. MI1.LER CHRISTIAN MEDICAL WORK IN KOREA By GEORGE HEBER JONES BOARD OF FOREIGN MISSIONS METHODIST EPISCOTAL CHURCH KOREA QUARTER-CENTENNIAL COMMISSION 150 FIFTH AVENUE NEW YORK CITY “And as ye go Heal the sick.” Jesus. “If we cannot capture humanity by our doctrines perhaps we can by our doctoring. The basin and the towel are the insignia of our religion as well as the cross.” George P. Eckman. MEDICAL WORK IN KOREA Not long since a man came to our dispensary in Pyeng- yang, and with a smile on his face greeted Dr. Foil well, the physician in charge, with “Don’t you know me?” The doctor thought a moment, tried hard, among the memories of the eighty-five thousand patients who had passed under his skill since he came to Korea, to recollect that particular man, but had to confess that he could not remember his name. “Why,” replied the man, “I w^as blind five years ago and you gave me sight, and as I was going through Pyeng- yang I felt I could not pass by without coming once more to thank you for your great kindness to me.” That single incident has value enough to justify all the expenditure of money and time on medical work in Korea since the be- ginning, and yet this man was only one among five hundred thousand men, women, and children who have received relief from sickness at the hands of the medical missionaries of the Methodist Episcopal Mission in that country. In the formal statement prepared by Dr. Robert S. Maclay, the first of our missionaries to visit Seoul, concern- ing the purpose of Christian missions, emphasis was laid upon the ministry to the sick, and from the founding of the mission this emphasis has been maintained. As a result Christian hospitals, with their dispensaries, and the country medical evangelistic work of the physicians, have disarmed prejudice, opened the doors of multiplied thousands of Korean homes, and won many souls for Christ. The medical missionary in Korea has followed the example of his Lord by going about doing good, and stands for the best in West- ern civilization by giving himself to one of the most highly appreciated and effective forms of practical Christian service. The reputation of our hospitals is more than that of secu- lar institutions where professional service is granted in return for money; they are places where the needy sick may 5 obtain care and relief. This is well illustrated by another incident at Pyeng-yang. One day a man fell among thieves, and was left bruised and bleeding by the wayside. He was robbed of all he had and left to die, his hands, face, and clothing covered with his A TYPICAL KOREAN FAMILY AND THEIR HOME The chief characteristics of the house are darkness, lack of air, and lack of space own blood. In this condition he was found by a passerby, w^ho, seeing his helpless condition, called a farmhand, and together they brought him to our dispensary. After attend- ing to the man’s wounds the doctor asked the Korean why G he had brought the man to him and not taken him to a gov- ernment hospital. The man answered: “Is there a hospital in any part of our country other than those belonging to the Christians where the poor and helpless are welcomed and will be cared for?” This testimony to the value of our Christian hospitals indicates the attitude of the masses of the people toward them. SOME RESULTS OF MEDICAL MISSIONS Christian medical missions have exerted a far-reaching influence in Korea. The following significant facts indicate this: 1. The first resident missionary in Korea was a physician. He had to face the opposition and antagonism of a people ignorant of and unfriendly to the Christian faith. All mis- sions that have entered Korea have sent physicians among their first missionaries. By their skill they compel a friendly and favorable reception to Christianity. It has been said that Korea was opened to missions by the lancet of the Christian doctor. 2. Christian physicians brought to the Korean people their first knowledge of modern medical science. Previous to their coming the native medical service held to practices of a cruel and revolting character, and many of the remedies used were loathsome and abominable. The loss of life through ignorant and vicious medical practice was enormous. The first messengers of a new day for the sick and dying were Christian doctors, and to them the nation owes its first knowledge of great modern remedies like quinine. 3. Christian missions founded the first hospitals and dis- pensaries where on anything like an adequate scale Korean communities could find medical service. A hospital or dispensary was not known in the empire of Korea until founded by a Christian missionary. 4. Christian missions established the first nurses’ training schools in Korea, and educated the first graduate nurses ever known among the people. In this way they not only brought to the Korean people the helpful ministry of the trained nurse, but opened up for the womanhood of the land a new and far-reaching field of activity. 5. It was due to the efforts of Christian physicians that the first successful attempts were made to check the ravages THE FIRST GRADUATE KOREAN NURSES AND THEIR DIPLOMAS [w. F. M. S.] of epidemics like Asiatic cholera, the bubonic plague, and smallpox. By their efforts and the extension of the lines of work which they first inaugurated in Korea many thousands of lives have been saved and multiplied thousands of years of life and usefulness have been added to the sum total of life in Korea. 6. Christian physicians pioneered the way for sanitary science. Previous to their coming there was no word in the Korean language for sanitation. They gave the Koreans the first suggestion of that idea. From these facts it will be seen that Christian medical missions have done a large and valuable service in setting up the kingdom of our Lord among the Korean people. 8 REASONS FOR MEDICAL MISSIONS As urgent as the necessity was for Christian medical missions in Korea in the pioneer days, the necessity is many- fold more urgent at the present time, and for that reason the Methodist Episcopal Church in its Quarter-Centennial WHERE UNTIL RECENTLY THE CITY OF PYENG-YANG WITH A POPULATION OF 60,000 HAS PROCURED ITS SUPPLY OF DRINKING WATER DURING ITS THREE THOUSAND YEARS OF HISTORY Movement is appealing for contributions to establish an adequate medical mission plant in the field which has been assigned to us through cooperative agreements with the other missions at work in that land. It is proposed to locate medical men at our interior stations. The following are some of the reasons which call for this: 1. It is as true to-day as ever that the sick in Korea, as in all nations, constitute a special class standing in sore need of Christian sympathy and service and peculiarly open to Christian influence and impression. They present them- selves as insistently a class calling for special service as do the children and the young people in their call for educa- tional work. 9 2. There is a pitiful lack of trained medical practitioners throughout Korea. The Christian physician will often be the only medical practitioner in the city in which he is lo- cated, and in the region through which he will work there will be whole counties where there will be no physicians at all. 3. It is necessary that there should be a physician at an interior mission station in order to care for the health of the resident missionaries and their families. It is a serious thing to send the wives and children of American mis- sionaries to posts where they will be several days’ journey from the nearest doctor, and it is the practice of the Board of Foreign Missions that there shall be a physician at each interior station. In emphasizing this need, Dr. Follwell, the senior physician of the mission, says in his report: “Twice during the past year I was hastily summoned to Yeng-ben because of sickness in our mission family there. On each occasion it was twenty-six hours from the time word was sent me before I was able to reach the sick one, and even before I was notified the little one had been ill one or more days. Think of the strain upon the family watching by the bedside of the little child with the doctor twenty-six hours away by the most rapid transit possible! A mother is more than walling to go through the valley of the shadow of death for her little ones, and wall bear agony and pain for them when such experience is necessary, but is it not too much to ask our coworkers in the outstations to remain so far from the services of a doctor when illness enters their homes? The women of our outstations are brave, loyal, and true, and in pleading for medical men for Kong-ju, Haiju, Yeng-ben, and Wonju it is not because I feel that the friends are not in sympathy with placing them at these centers (I know the contrary to be true), but it is because I w'ant to emphasize at this time the importance of the step and to impress upon all hearts the fact that there must be provision made for medical missionaries at our outstations before our married workers can or should reside there permanently.” 10 4. The medical missionary is an effective soul- winner. The hospitals themselves are centers of evangelistic work, LIVING EXAMPLES OF MEDICAL MISSION- ARY WORK UNDER THE W. F. M. S. The girl to the left has had her arms ampu- tated. The girl to the right has had a bone removed from her leg. Both are able to write and take care of themselves. and along with healing of the body the healing message of Jesus Christ is ministered to the needy souls of men and women. OUR MEDICAL PLANS The sum total for medical work called for in the budget of the Quarter-Centennial Fund is less than Fifty Thou- sand Dollars, a sum which many men in our church could amply afford to give. It is thrilling to think of the good that would be accomplished by one such gift, for by the investment of Fifty Thousand Dollars a man could be instrumental in erecting hospitals and dispensaries at 11 strategic points throughout the empire of Korea which for two generations would administer physical relief to not less than fifty thousand men, women, and children annually, and that besides being instrumental in bringing the gospel message to the multiplied thousands who make up their friends and families, out of which knowledge would come many thousands of souls won from sin and death to ever- lasting hfe. The following is the proposed budget for medical work in Korea: Hospital at Pyeng-yang $12,000 Hospital at Kong-ju 10,000 Hospital at Yeng-ben 7,000 Hospital at Haiju 7,000 Hospital at Wonju 5,000 In addition to the above sums for buildings, there should be added the amounts necessary for furniture, instruments, apparatus, and drugs. Fifty Thousand Dollars would be amply sufficient for the above five buildings and their equipment . Presenting these five stations in order, we have: 1. Pyexg-yaxg Pyeng-yang is the capital city of the South Pyeng-an Province, with a population of about 50,000, and the strongest Christian center in the empire. It was here the great revival of 1907 took its rise and has given to the town the name of the Korean Jerusalem. Here is located our strongest mission station, with seven mission families, besides the workers of the Woman’s Foreign ^lissionary Society, in residence. Dr. Foil well arrived in Pyeng-j^ang in 1896, and during the first year of his service treated 3,000 patients. This has grown to a clinic of 13,223 treatments during the year March 1st, 1909, to February 2Sth, 1910. During his service as physician in charge of the hospital he 12 has treated over 98,000 patients. Surely this is a great record for one man! With what facilities has this been carried on? This great work has been done in a small detached native building of mud walls and ceiling; another building, consisting of two HALL MEMORIAL HOSPITAL, PYENG-YANG wards each twelve feet square, and the kitchen and living room for the hospital orderly, and an old barn used for isolation purposes. The whole present plant is quite unfit in which to do proper medical work. It originally cost under $1,500, and for the past thirteen years has been our make-shift in which the doctor has struggled on, hoping for the day when he would have something like fair facilities with which to work. It is very evident that in such sur- roundings, and with the poorest and most meager equip- ment, it is impossible to obtain satisfactory results. The sum proposed in the estimates of $12,000 will erect a small but modern hospital and dispensary, thoroughly equipped with steam heat and light, and possessing a first- class operating room and wards. 13 2. Kong-ju This city is the capital of the South Chung-chong Pro\’ince, and the seat of our second largest mission station in Korea. Here are resident five mission families, besides a home for workers under the Woman’s Foreign Missionary' Society, directing work in a parish with fully one million population and in which we are the only mission at work. There is a fine site for a hospital and dispensary already secured, but plans to build part of the basement, put a roof over it, and use it for a temporary dispensary are rendered futile because of a lack of funds. Dr, ^"an Buskirk, the resident physician, possesses a working knowledge of the language and is ready for work, but without a hospital, dispensary, drugs, or facilities is thoroughly handicapped. It is the plan of the mission to erect a hospital to cost 810,000, which will build a two-story brick building with room for a dispensary and wards to accommodate twenty in-patients. The dispensary will treat probably not less than ten thousand patients a year. 3. Yexg-bex Yeng-ben is the principal city in the mountainous region of the North Pyeng-an Province, It has a population of about 7,000, but is the only Christian mission station in a region containing seven counties, covering a territory 150 miles long by 75 miles in width, and with a population esti- mated at at least one quarter of a million. The doctor is assisted by one native helper, who does his best to help care for the crowds of patients who come seeking relief, which the native doctors have tried in vain to give. Dr. I. M. Miller, who has lately gone to Yeng-ben as the repre- sentative of the Division Street Church, Grand Rapids, Mich., will be in charge of the work. In order to adequately meet the demands placed upon us in that region a building sufficiently large and well equipped to enable us to handle this work advantageously is urgently needed. The site for the building is already in our possession — a prominent hill- side just off the main road, overlooking the cit}', and ex- 14 cellently located for hospital purposes. It is estimated that the cost of the building will be $7,000. Inasmuch as the THE CHIEF RELIANCE OF THE KOREANS IN TIME OF SICKNESS PROPITIATION AND SACRIFICE TO THE DEMONS patients willingly pay a small fee intended to cover the cost of drugs used, the institution will enjoy a measure of self-support. 4. Haiju This also is a provincial capital, being the principal city of the Whang-hai Province, which has a population of 958,852. There is only one other foreign physician, a medical mis- sionary of the Presbyterian mission station fifty miles north from Haiju. A conservative estimate of the population of the large district which will be served by our mission station puts it at 500,000. Haiju City itself has a population of 40,000. Recently Dr. Norton has gone there, but he does so with no hospital and only a temporary building in which to work as a dispensary and only such funds as may be found from outside sources with which to begin his work. Build- 15 ings are absolutely needed, and it is estimated that S7,000 will build a brick hospital that will meet the needs of the field. o. Woxju This is the principal city in the southern half of the Kang- won Province, which stretches along the east coast of Korea. Our station there is a new one, and will be the most distant and inaccessible of all our Korean mission stations. It will serve a territory which has a population of 400,000 people, and ours will be the only point where they can secure mod- ern medical relief. For the purpose of erecting a small hospital, with dispensary and operating room and ward accommodations at this point, the sum of S5,000 is asked. Will not somebody take advantage of this opportunity for an investment in one of the neediest and yet, in the way of returns, one of the most productive regions in the mission field? OPPORTUNITIES FOR PAYING INVESTMENTS In conclusion, the estimates necessaiy to maintain staff and equipment yearly in these hospitals will be of interest. Salary of trained assistant one year SI 50 Salary of native trained nurse 120 Salary of second assistant 90 Salary of hospital evangelist 90 Salary of hospital orderly 60 Salary of hospital Bible woman 60 Annual cost maintenance of a bed to treat those who cannot pay 45 Will not the physicians of our Methodist Episcopal Church in this great land of ours, where the advantages of Christian civilization and modern medical science are so free and adequate, interest themselves in this field to give to a sorely distressed and heartbroken people a share in the blessings which we so freely enjoy? 16