There were numerous academicians, professors and assistant professors, historians of medicine, representatives of healthcare facilities, and heads of the MMA’s organizational units present to the event.
The attendees were addressed on behalf of the Serbian Medical Society by Academician, Prof. Dr. Branislav Dimitrijević, who said that the Serbian Medical Society highly valued efforts the Military Medical Academy was making to honor the work of leading figures in the history of Serbian Medicine.
The president of the Serbian Medical Society’s Academy of Medical Sciences Prof. Dr. Pavle Milenković also expressed his contentment to see how scientific events of such kind were becoming a nice tradition of two institutions, which, respecting their past, were building their present and were thinking about the future of next generations.
This scientific meeting was opened by the MMA’s head Major General Prof. Dr. Miodrag Jevtić. ‘’The Military Medical Academy is the institution that ranks among the largest military medical institutions in the world; it practices the top medicine and produces future generations of military physicians, i.e. cadets of the MMA’s School for Advanced Studies, and it pays a great attention to the scientific-research work and publishing activity. We are proud of our 166-year long tradition. In search of our roots, we’ve found out that a series of everlasting values of remarkable physicians and exceptional figures were continuously threading throughout a long history. That has inspired us to never let their work be forgotten. The tradition we initiated last year by organizing scientific conference devoted to Dr. Vladan Đorđević, will be continued here and today, led by our wish and intention to highlight the portrait and work of Dr. Dr. Đorđević’s successor to the position of the Military Medical Services Surgeon General, that is Dr. Mihajilo Mika Marković’, said General Jevtić.
A Research Fellow, Dr. Elizabeta Ristanović, the head of the MMA’s Morale and PR Department promoted the book dedicated to Mihajilo Mika Marković, His Life and Work. She said that the intention of its authors Jokanović, Jevtić, Ristanović, Jovanović-Simić was to pay back for the grandiose work this physician bequeathed to us, and stressed that that work imposed an obligation, in particular, on the members of the Military Medical Services.
Academician, Dr. Vladimir Jokanović spoke about Dr. Mika Marković as a man, physician and soldier, whilst Dr. Jelena Jovanović- Simić, devoted her speech to contributions Dr. Marković made to the development of the Serbian Medical Society during his two terms as president.
In his report, Major General Prof. Dr. Miodrag Jevtić gave a detailed review of Dr. Mihajilo Mika Markovi’s contributions to the reform and development of Serbian Military Medical Services.
‘Mihajilo Mika Marković is one of Serbian physicians who very high carried the flag of physician’s ethics throughout his 35-year long military medical career. He joined the Military in 1877, and, in 1886, assumed the position of the Surgeon General of the Serbian Military. In his history, he left behind non-erasable traces in the field of Medical Tactics and Strategy as well as in the domain of improvements to the War Surgery Doctrine’, said General Jevtić, and added that War Surgery of that time was facing a great problem relating not to the surgical treatment of wounds, but to the postoperative care of mostly gun shot wounds, which were primary and secondary infected and accompanied by a septic shock, what very often resulted in additional amputation of wounded extremities.
Having closely followed the medical literature, Dr. Mihajilo Marković learned that the French and Prussia Army had introduced iodine antiseptic as a very successful medical device in the treatment of wounds, i.e. infection prevention.
At wartime, successes of a Serbian surgeon were also witnessed by foreign physicians during their missions to provide support to the Serbian Medical Services.
General Jevtić emphasized in particular Dr. Marković’s role in the construction of military hospitals and great importance of education of military physicians. ‘’Dr. Marković knew that military academies in Petrograd, Berlin and London offered officers-physicians opportunities to be trained for military service and service under war conditions as well. Therefore, he passed a legal regulation on recruitment of young people among the best pupils regardless of their origin. Dr. Marković established criteria the candidates for the medical studies had to satisfy, and developed plans for their further military career development and advancement. Among the successes Dr. Markovic achieved while serving as a Surgeon General, advanced training in War Surgery, Medical Tactics and Hygiene take important places. Considering how to, efficiently and cost-effectively, raise physicians’ awareness about the latest achievements and new knowledge, he opted for the system of short courses and invited the most renowned national and international doctors’, said General Jevtić. Dr. Marković felt the spirit of the time and could foresee the future trends in Surgery, which was highly recognized as a medical discipline in Western countries. In that context, 5 surgical departments were opened up in military hospitals, and the foundations of this discipline were laid.
Mika Marković also managed to get an agreement on the basis of which military hospitals provided health care services to civilian patients. Due to strong discipline and hygiene measures, military hospitals were more successful in surgical treatment, so Dr. Marković’s intent to build hospitals in Kruševac and Pirot was fully supported. As previously mentioned, Dr. Marković deserved as well all the credit for construction of the Niš Military Surgical Hospital. Traveling to foreign countries, Dr. Marković tried to introduce European achievements into Serbia’, stressed General Jevtić. He tried to put hospitals he constructed all across Serbia in the service of Serbian people. They were managed by qualified and trained personnel and equipped with sophisticated devices and instruments. Each hospital had sterilizing apparatuses, whilst paramedics dealing with sterilization had to undergo special training. To that aim, he developed a curriculum for paramedic training.
During the period when he headed the Military Medical Services, Dr. Marković introduced obligatory examination for those who wanted to earn the rank of Major. It included very serious tests requiring long-term and thorough test preparations. The main examination subject was on the military medical sciences ranging from Surgery and Medical Tactics to Pharmacology and Hygiene. The Examination Committee comprised the members of unquestionable authority. In his attempt to ‘’settle’’ matters within the Military Medical Services, Dr. Marković, tried to pass regulations and provisions that would govern almost every segment of it. He was particularly concerned with drug and pharmacology-related issues.
Following the modern European Armed Forces, Dr. Marković tried to organize, in line with Medical Tactical Doctrine, provision of drugs, dressings, instruments and other medical materiel for field hospitals.
Every one who studies the history of Serbian Military Medical Services can find interesting written material on the basis of which Medical Tactics and organizational structure of War- and Peacetime Health Care Service can be analyzed.
Dr Marković unselfishly contributed to the establishment of the first Institute of Bacteriology and Hygiene for vaccine production in our country, what, in terms of medical profession, ranked Serbia even 110 years ago among more developed countries
On the occasion of the MMA’s Day, the portrait bust of Dr. Mihajilo Mika Marković will be unveiled in the yard of the Military Medical Academy.