Level Of Medical Knowledge Research Articles

Theoretical substantiation of aspects of physical culture, health and health-preserving activities of the individual

Physical education, health improvement and health-preserving activities are closely related and intertwined, since they are aimed at achieving and maintaining a person’s physical, mental and social well-being. Preserving and strengthening public health is an important task not only for individuals, but also for society as a whole and any modern state. This is facilitated by a healthcare system whose main goal is to improve the health and well-being of the population by providing comprehensive, high- quality and accessible care to all people, thereby ensuring the sustainability of the development of the country as a whole. Maintaining health at the individual level presupposes the choice of such forms of activity that contribute to the preservation and strengthening of human health. This choice is determined by the level of a person’s culture, acquired knowledge and life attitudes, such as: maintaining an optimal movement regime, taking into account gender, age and physiological characteristics; balanced, regular, rational nutrition; cessation of self-destructive behavior: cessation of smoking, use of psychoactive substances, alcohol abuse; compliance with the rules of personal and public hygiene; compliance with the rules of psychoprophylaxis and psychological hygiene; increasing the level of medical knowledge, mastering the skills of self-monitoring of one’s own health. The article analyzes the scientific literature on preserving and strengthening the health of the population through physical education and health activities. The increased interest of scientists in this problem is due to the increased social demand for the formation of a value-based attitude among the population towards their own health; formation of motivation aimed at health-saving activities of each person through physical activity.

Bridge to Practice: A Qualitative Evaluation of Joint Medical Program (JMP) International Medical Graduates Perceived Preparedness for Professional Practice.

This study sought to examine the views of international graduates regarding how they perceived the Joint Medical Program Bachelor of Medicine (JMP BMed) undergraduate training prepared them to practice in a health system different from that in which they had studied. Eighteen international graduates of the JMP between 2010 and 2017 inclusive agreed to be interviewed face-to-face. JMP BMed international graduates were interviewed using 18 standardized questions to elicit perceptions of their preparedness to practice and reflections on their training experience. The interview data were qualitatively analyzed, and the main themes were identified and categorized. Overall, the international graduates of the JMP BMed curriculum felt well-prepared for tasks associated with communication, self-directed learning, and approaching mental health issues. Conversely, they perceived the level of clinical exposure and experience as inadequate in preparing them for the expected level of medical knowledge and responsibility. They also felt underprepared for navigating a different health system. The strengths and weaknesses identified in the JMP BMed program in its preparation of international graduates, particularly those who chose to practice in their country of origin, are of relevance for all medical schools that enrol international students. Greater awareness of the needs of international medical students returning home to practice may be of value for future curriculum planning purposes to ensure that medical schools optimally prepare their graduates to practice with confidence in a range of healthcare systems.

Gender Differences in Medical Students’ Perception of Neurosurgery: A Cross-Sectional Study from Pakistan

Despite 15,000 annual medical graduates, few choose neurosurgery, especially women. The scarcity of female neurosurgeons is a global concern, particularly in resource-limited settings such as Pakistan. This study focuses on gender-based differences in medical student perceptions of neurosurgery in Pakistan. A nationwide cross-sectional study was conducted from March 6 to April 20, 2023, using a Web-based survey. Data collectors were recruited through an ambassadorship program, distributed evenly across all provinces. A questionnaire was used after a pilot study. Data analysis was performed using SPSS version 26 and STATA15. A total of 2353 medical students participated in the study, of which 63.4% were female and 36.5% were male. Around 40.3% of women strongly agreed to the existence of potential gender bias in neurosurgery, in contrast to their corresponding male students, at 17.3%. Some of the highlighted deterring factors in pursuing neurosurgery as a career according to women include longer training duration (44.6%), poor work-life balance (41%), limited residency slots (50.6%), and limited exposure to neurosurgery (45.1%). Other factors included the high-intensity nature of training (33.6%), perceived gender bias (31.4%), competitive work environment (29.1%), complex surgical skills (38.6%), required level of medical knowledge (29.6%), and financial burden (33.9%). Our study shows that female students are more likely to believe in the existence of potential gender bias in the field compared with their counterpart male participants, which highlights the graveness of the situation in view of the evident paucity of female neurosurgeons in the country.

Історія формування лікарень у Середні століття: ідеологія та економіка

The article shows that the creation of public hospitals in the early Middle Ages in Europe was the first time in the history of medicine. It was a consequence of the establishment of Christian values in society regarding caring for those who need help. It has been proven that as the institution of the state medieval church in Western Europe was formed and its organization and teaching departed from evangelical principles, the provision of medical care became its full commitment and was used by it as one of the tools of influence on society. It has been established that equating medieval hospitals with the concept of modern hospitals is fundamentally incorrect and unfounded, because medieval hospitals were almshouses for care, and not actual medical institutions. Such a development was impossible in principle at that time. The Church actually forbade its monks to practice medicine. In addition, the level of medical knowledge of that time about diseases made it impossible for the very appearance of hospitals, where the concepts of diagnosis, methods of dynamic observation and treatment would be recognized and available. The appearance of the first hospitals in the medical sense of the word is not related to the activity of the church, but to the development of city self-government and the departure of university education from the control of the church, which allowed city hospitals to introduce medical technologies and become medical institutions. Hospitals of monastic orders during the time of the Crusades show the influence of function on the structure of such organizations, when, on the one hand, the need to provide assistance to wounded soldiers and knights prompted them to have a medical component in their composition, and on the other hand, their further development became impossible, because the activities of their founders changed: monks the orders turned into feudal military and commercial organizations, far from mercy and compassion. The study of the development of the establishment of hospitals clearly illustrates the close relationship between, on the one hand, the need for proper spiritual development and education of society with its understanding of moral criteria and principles, and on the other, the development of a scientific and technical base based on university education. The evolution of the formation of hospitals illustrates the close relationship between the need for proper spiritual development of society, its understanding of moral criteria and principles, and the development of their scientific and technical base based on university education.

Lung cancer survival among Florida male firefighters.

Lung cancer is a leading cause of cancer incidence and death in the United States. Although most firefighters are fit and do not smoke, they are exposed to many known carcinogens during and in the aftermath of firefighting activities. Comprehensive epidemiologic investigations on lung cancer survival for both career and volunteer firefighters have not been undertaken. Data from the Florida Cancer Data System (1981-2014) were linked with firefighter certification records from the Florida State Fire Marshal's Office to identify all patients of this occupational group; lung cancer cause-specific survival data were compared with other occupational groups using Cox regression models with occupation as the main effect. Adjusted hazard ratios (aHR) and 95% confidence intervals (95% CI) were calculated. Out of 210,541 male lung cancer cases diagnosed in Florida (1981-2014), 761 were firefighters (604 career, 157 volunteer). Lung cancer death was similar between volunteer (75.2%) and career firefighters (74.0%) but lower than non-firefighters (80.0%). Survival at 5 years was higher among firefighters (29.7%; career: 30.3%; volunteer: 27.4%) than non-firefighters (23.8%). In a multivariable model, compared with non-firefighters, firefighters have significantly higher cause-specific survival (aHR = 0.84; 95% CI: 0.77-0.91; p < 0.001). However, there were no significant survival differences between career and volunteer firefighters (1.14; 0.93-1.39; p = 0.213). In a separate multivariable model with firefighters as the comparator, other broad occupational groups had significantly lower cause-specific survival [white collar: 1.11 (1.02-1.21); blue collar: 1.15 (1.05-1.25); service: 1.13 (1.03-1.25); others/unknown: 1.21 (1.12-1.32); all p-values < 0.02]. Lung cancer survival is significantly higher among firefighters compared with non-firefighters, but there is no significant difference between career and volunteer firefighters. Improved survival for firefighters might be due to a healthy worker effect, lower smoking prevalence relative to other worker groups, and possibly superior treatment adherence and compliance. Many firefighters are cross-trained as EMTs/paramedics and possess a level of medical knowledge that may favorably impact treatment engagement and better navigation of complex cancer care.

537-P: Virtual Patient Simulation Assesses the Levels of Competency and Improves Performance of Advance Practice Providers in the Field of Diabetes and Cardiometabolic Medicine

Introduction: A high level of medical knowledge of Advanced Practice Providers is extremely important to secure their role in the contemporary healthcare environment. Continuing Medical Education is the key element in improving their skills and level of competency. Hypothesis: We hypothesized that a mobile and desktop VPS application that provides a self-propelled simulation of disease progression and the effects of treatments, would allow precise assessment of providers’ medical knowledge. Methods: We used the Edocate® virtual patient simulation (VPS) platform to compare the level of competency in treating patients with type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular problems in two groups of nurse practitioners: diabetes-trained (DNP) and family medicine-trained (FNP). All participants completed the same VPS case before being asked to address a second case with similar problems, thus enabling us to assess improvement in their knowledge as well. For each case, the NPs received personalized and detailed feedback on their actions. Results: DNP were significantly more likely to achieve good glycemic control (78.6% vs. 46.8% in the FNP cohort), control of hyperlipidemia (57.1% vs. 40.0%), control of blood pressure (78.5% vs. 46.6%), and were more likely to use SGLT2i or GLP1 RA in patients with cardiovascular problems (78.4% vs. 66.7%). Both groups improved their performance markedly while working with their second patient, reaching levels of competency in key clinical areas between 83 and 100% in both groups. Conclusion: Working with the VPS, DNP demonstrated a higher level of medical knowledge in diabetes and cardiovascular disease management than FNP. However, training with the VPS platform significantly improved the levels of competency in both groups supporting the notion that virtual simulation provides excellent tools for enhancing providers’ knowledge, critical for their real practice skills. Disclosure I.Iancu: None. R.Shental: None. L.Zehavi: None. B.Draznin: None.

ChatGPT in medical school: how successful is AI in progress testing?

ABSTRACT Background As generative artificial intelligence (AI), ChatGPT provides easy access to a wide range of information, including factual knowledge in the field of medicine. Given that knowledge acquisition is a basic determinant of physicians’ performance, teaching and testing different levels of medical knowledge is a central task of medical schools. To measure the factual knowledge level of the ChatGPT responses, we compared the performance of ChatGPT with that of medical students in a progress test. Methods A total of 400 multiple-choice questions (MCQs) from the progress test in German-speaking countries were entered into ChatGPT’s user interface to obtain the percentage of correctly answered questions. We calculated the correlations of the correctness of ChatGPT responses with behavior in terms of response time, word count, and difficulty of a progress test question. Results Of the 395 responses evaluated, 65.5% of the progress test questions answered by ChatGPT were correct. On average, ChatGPT required 22.8 s (SD 17.5) for a complete response, containing 36.2 (SD 28.1) words. There was no correlation between the time used and word count with the accuracy of the ChatGPT response (correlation coefficient for time rho = −0.08, 95% CI [−0.18, 0.02], t(393) = −1.55, p = 0.121; for word count rho = −0.03, 95% CI [−0.13, 0.07], t(393) = −0.54, p = 0.592). There was a significant correlation between the difficulty index of the MCQs and the accuracy of the ChatGPT response (correlation coefficient for difficulty: rho = 0.16, 95% CI [0.06, 0.25], t(393) = 3.19, p = 0.002). Conclusion ChatGPT was able to correctly answer two-thirds of all MCQs at the German state licensing exam level in Progress Test Medicine and outperformed almost all medical students in years 1–3. The ChatGPT answers can be compared with the performance of medical students in the second half of their studies.

HIV/AIDS in Afghanistan: A Review of Prevalence, Perspectives, and Associated Factors

AIDS, considered one of the leading causes of death worldwide, is not exempt in Afghanistan. This virus targets the human immune system, paving the way for various infections. The first AIDS case was reported in Afghanistan in 1989, and over time, due to increased migration and drug usage, the rate of HIV/AIDS prevalence increased dramatically. Although the prevalence of this disease in our country is relatively low on a global scale, Afghanistan is recognized as one of the high-risk areas for HIV/AIDS transmission.&#x0D; The virus spreads through activities such as blood transfusion and mucous membrane abrasions. The primary reason for the spread of HIV in our country is the presence of vulnerable populations (drug addicts, prisoners, sex workers, and returning migrants infected from neighboring areas). Additionally, low levels of medical knowledge, poor healthcare services, cultural pressures, and constant stigma against patients lead infected individuals to avoid healthcare facilities, thereby creating a conducive environment for the further spread of AIDS.&#x0D; To effectively combat the AIDS epidemic in Afghanistan, implementing comprehensive policies for HIV control and treating injecting drug users is essential. Stronger control and monitoring of returning migrants at the country's borderlines, the use of impactful graphic warning labels on advertisements, regular advertising campaigns through media and healthcare centers, and establishing well-equipped centers for patient treatment are crucial and supportive measures.

Assessment of First Aid Emergency Knowledge Among Medical Students from First Year to Final Year-A Comparative Study

Objectives: To assess the level of first aid knowledge among undergraduate medical students in Army Medical College, Rawalpindi. The research aimed to compare the level of medical knowledge across five years of medical training and to evaluate the effect of demographic details on the degree of first aid awareness.&#x0D; Study Design: The study design is cross-sectional.&#x0D; Place and Duration of Study: Study was conducted in Army Medical College, Rawalpindi Pakistan, from Nov 2021 to Apr2022&#x0D; Methodology: A preformed questionnaire was used and was divided into two groups: The first group contained two parts: i) Personal information and ii) Question about previous attendance of the first aid course. The second group contained 14 questions aimed at assessing major aspects of first-aid. The results for every year were compared. Data was entered an SPSS version 25.&#x0D; Results: In the study there was a marked increase in the level of first aid knowledge from first year to final year. The study also showed that those living at home had better scores than those availing university accommodation. Demographic background or receiving training in first-aid had an insignificant effect on it.&#x0D; Conclusion: The study discovered that the academic year had a substantial impact on knowledge levels. From first year to final year, there was a significant increase in first-aid knowledge. Every year, medical students' first-aid education should be reinforced in order to improve their skills.

Infant and childhood death in the medical profession. Evidence from nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Netherlands

AbstractThis paper shows the effect that the medical expertise of medical practitioners had on the life chances of their children. We focus on infant and early childhood mortality. We reconstructed the life histories of the offspring of a group of around 2800 medical practitioners who were practicing in a high-mortality region in the Netherlands between 1850 and 1922, the period during which infant and child mortality in the Netherlands underwent the largest changes. The survival of their offspring is compared with that of a random sample of children from the Historical Sample of the Netherlands. Multilevel hazard analysis, using Cox proportional hazards models with shared frailty, is applied to study the effect of belonging to the medical profession on survival, in relation to the level of infant mortality in the regions where children were born. Within the group of medical practitioners, attention is paid to differences in children’s survival according to the level of medical knowledge of the fathers. Our statistical analyses show that the offspring of medical practitioners as a whole did have better survival prospects than children born to families without a father with a medical background. When medical practitioners had effective medical knowledge, measured by the period of graduation and the highest level of medical training reached, the positive effects on the survival of their children were even stronger.

Crtice o pravnom uređenju bolnica u srednjevekovnoj Srbiji

Medieval hospitals, and more broadly, health care in general, were in the beginnings accessible only to a small part of the population. They were created primarily for the needs of monks in large monastic centers, such as Hilandar and Studenica. Their organisation was regulated by the provisions of the typics, written under Roman influence, and adapted according to the circumstances of medieval Serbia. The mission of these institutions was primarily the healing of the sick, and over time, specialisation in the treatment of diseases and care for people with disabilities became more prominent. Data on their organisation, as well as on the status of hospital staff and patients comes from various legal, but also literary, archaeological and other sources. The level of medical knowledge of „hospital employees”, the appearance of doctors later on and special hospital administration greatly helped the development of hospital care, whose benefits would begin to be felt by the secular population, even before the emergence of city hospitals. Finally, in order for them to be able to perform their functions, it is necessary to considerthe regulation of their property, as well as its legal nature.

Experiences with cross-sectional healthcare and treatment in heart failure patients: implications for medical education.

to explore how cross-sectional healthcare and treatment is experienced a) by patients with advanced heart failure and multimorbidity and b) by hospital-employed healthcare professionals. Individual telephone interviews with 18 patients and close relatives were conducted. Furthermore, a focus group session was conducted with four specialised hospital-employed healthcare professionals. Purposeful sampling was used and interviews were semi-structured. Data were analysed using qualitative inductive content analysis. Three main themes emerged from the interviews with patients and close relatives. These included: 1) A need for improved coordination to ensure continuity of care; 2) a plea for patient-centred care; and 3) recognition of the need to care for close relatives. Analysis of the interviews with hospital-employed healthcare professionals also produced three themes. These concerned: 1) recognition of the role and needs of close relatives; 2) limited resources for and difficulties in meeting these needs; and 3) agreement on the need for patient-centred care. Furthermore, we learned that perceived challenges are rooted in time constraints and the need for an adequate level of medical knowledge of chronic conditions and complex treatment strategies. This study indicates that cross-sectional healthcare and treatment of patients with advanced heart failure and multimorbidity lacked coordination, was insufficiently patient-centred and did not cater for close relatives' needs. The study identifies patient-centredness and coordination of healthcare services targeting patients and close relatives alike as critical to proper care, medical curriculum development and continued medical training courses.

Racism in German medical education – Perspectives of racialized physicians and medical students

Abstract Background The impact of racism on health and the quality of health care services for racialized patients have been the object of prior research. The experiences of racialized medical students and physicians, who operate in a field of tension between natural sciences and practical application and between a ‘medical habitus’ and exclusionary discrimination, have hardly been examined to date. The education of (future) physicians is an especially fruitful research area in the context of the study of institutional racism in the health care system, as informal everyday experiences come together with formal knowledge and normative learning. Methods Based on expert consultations and preliminary interviews with civic stakeholders, teaching and learning materials in German medical studies were randomly sampled and used as a starting point for qualitative guided interviews with physicians and medical students in Germany who are themselves affected by racism. The first steps of the thematic analysis of these interviews are reflected upon and further developed in focus group discussions with the interviewees. Results The study is particularly concerned with the question of how certain dimensions of racism in the health care sector are related, and how racist normativity appears in this context. This is concretized in the relationship between formal and informal medical curricula as well as in the interweaving of everyday experiences and teaching materials. Conclusions There are different dimensions of relation between a hegemonic normativity in the medical curriculum and the everyday experiences of racialized medical students and physicians in Germany. Politics, faculties, publishers, and civic society may be the target of several recommendations for action regarding those diverse dimensions, e.g. the line between omission and stereotyping of several patient groups. Key messages • Hegemonic normativity in German medical education is an important and challenging issue. There are several institutional levels of medical knowledge reproducing racism in the health care sector. • Both racialized physicians and racialized patients are affected by symbolic and material forms of racism in the German health care system, which are interweaving and crucial on diverse levels.

Confucian Medicine: A Medical Handbook of 19th Century England

Abstract This article takes the “A Medical Handbook” as an example to try to reveal how Western missionaries and Chinese translators jointly translated Western medical knowledge when it was introduced into the East during the 19th century. In this process, the fusion of Chinese and Western medical knowledge led to the Chinese version of A Medical Handbook. Not only did Western missionaries unilaterally promote their medical knowledge, but Chinese local elites also played an indispensable role in the dissemination of Western medical knowledge. In the early days of Western knowledge spreading into China, Western medical knowledge was incorporated into the knowledge pedigree of traditional Chinese medicine to a certain extent, which enabled the Chinese public to accept the use of Western medicine. The collision between Chinese and Western cultures at the level of medical knowledge affected the integration of Western medical knowledge systems into the local Chinese medical knowledge system.

Healthcare patterns among medical professionals

The article is focused on attitudes of healthcare workers towards their health. The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, followed by a substantial increase in media coverage of public health-related issues, has dramatically altered many people’s normal routines and caused a shift in our collective perception of normal. In this context, examining the attitudes of health care workers toward their health becomes particularly topical as this group possesses first-hand knowledge about the pandemic and various medical subjects. We consider medical professionals as specially-trained people who possess evidence-based knowledge about our body, mental, and physical health. Since it is a challenging job that involves being in close contact with people who are sick or recovering from illness, the risks of which have been exacerbated by the pandemic, this group has privileged access to professional medical services. We conducted a quantitative sociological survey among medical professionals who work for the Moscow Health Care System. This research allows us to analyze patterns of health care utilization and health behavior among health care workers and the correlation between their attitudes and perceptions of the problem and the actual patterns of their behavior. This paper aims to answer the following question: how do the level of medical knowledge and privileged access to a wide range of health care services and resources affect the attitudes toward one’s own health that are common among the so-called expert groups?

Knowledge, Attitude, and Practice of Physicians Regarding Vaccinations in Yerevan, Armenia: A Case Study of HPV.

This paper highlights the low levels of vaccine coverage and high levels of reported vaccination hesitancy in Yerevan, Armenia, that present profound challenges to the control of disease through routine vaccination programmes. We draw on investigations of hesitancy towards the introduction of new vaccines, using the Human Papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine Gardasil as a case study, to interrogate underlying challenges to vaccine acceptance. We analyse primary data from the introduction of Gardasil, first used in Armenia in 2017, to investigate how levels of medical knowledge amongst physicians in 20 health facilities in Yerevan, Armenia, regarding vaccine science influence attitudes towards the introduction of a newly developed vaccine. A questionnaire-based cross-sectional study was completed by 348 physicians between December 2017 and September 2018. The responding physicians displayed a respectable level of knowledge and awareness regarding vaccination with respect to some characteristics (e.g., more than 81% knew that HPV infection was commonly asymptomatic, 73% knew that HPV infection was implicated in most cervical cancers, and 87% knew that cervical cancer is the most prevalent cancer amongst women) but low knowledge and poor understanding of other key issues such as the age at which women were most likely to develop cervical cancer (only 15% answered correctly), whether or not the vaccine should be administered to people who had already been infected (27% answered correctly) and whether sexually active young people should be treated for infection before vaccination (26% answered correctly). The study suggests that the drivers of vaccine hesitancy are complex and may not be consistent from vaccine to vaccine. The Armenian healthcare sector may need to provide additional training, awareness-raising and educational activities alongside the introduction of new vaccines to improve understanding of and trust in vaccination programmes.

Neuro-expressionism in Dante's divina comedy

The year 2021 marks the 700th anniversary of medieval poet and philosopher Dante Alighieri death. Dante a giant of Italian literature and credited as “father of the Italian language”, died in 1321 in Ravenna. He had a sound level of medical knowledge, as demonstrated by his description of mental disorders and attended courses at the University of Bologna and at the Sorbonne of Paris, where he may have also studied human anatomy and physiology reading ancient medical writings by Greek, Roman and Arab physicians.

What Behaviors Define a Good Physician? Assessing and Communicating About Noncognitive Skills.

Once medical students attain a certain level of medical knowledge, success in residency often depends on noncognitive attributes, such as conscientiousness, empathy, and grit. These traits are significantly more difficult to assess than cognitive performance, creating a potential gap in measurement. Despite its promise, competency-based medical education (CBME) has yet to bridge this gap, partly due to a lack of well-defined noncognitive observable behaviors that assessors and educators can use in formative and summative assessment. As a result, typical undergraduate to graduate medical education handovers stress standardized test scores, and program directors trust little of the remaining information they receive, sometimes turning to third-party companies to better describe potential residency candidates. The authors have created a list of noncognitive attributes, with associated definitions and noncognitive skills-called observable practice activities (OPAs)-written for learners across the continuum to help educators collect assessment data that can be turned into valuable information. OPAs are discrete work-based assessment elements collected over time and mapped to larger structures, such as milestones, entrustable professional activities, or competencies, to create learning trajectories for formative and summative decisions. Medical schools and graduate medical education programs could adapt these OPAs or determine ways to create new ones specific to their own contexts. Once OPAs are created, programs will have to find effective ways to assess them, interpret the data, determine consequence validity, and communicate information to learners and institutions. The authors discuss the need for culture change surrounding assessment-even for the adoption of behavior-based tools such as OPAs-including grounding the work in a growth mindset and the broad underpinnings of CBME. Ultimately, improving assessment of noncognitive capacity should benefit learners, schools, programs, and most importantly, patients.

Magiczne i lecznicze właściwości pokrzyku na podstawie staropolskich zielników

The aim of the article is to analyse the way of the description the nightshade as curative herb as well as polish mandrake’s equivalent. Researches based on Old Polish herbariums written by Stefan Falimirz, Marcin from Urzędów and Szymon Syreński. In this article was also important the issue of etymology of polish name of Atropa belladonna (in polish: pokrzyk – krzyk [scream], krzak [bush]) and level of medical knowledge in 16th and 17th centuries. The author also compared nightshade to mandrake: their properties (psychedelic, curative), morphologic qualities and beliefs connected to anthropoid shape of root, supposed deadly scream of plant pulled from the ground or use of this herb in magic.

MEDICINE ON THE EDGE OF THE HABSBURG TERRITORIES

Designed as a defensive system against the Ottoman Empire, the Austrian military border was doubled by a sanitary cordon, which served as a defense shield against epidemics. In order for this system to function adequately, the border patrol troops that served the House of Habsburg also needed protection against the diseases that threatened the empire. The present study brings into discussion the health problems that border guards from the Banat region experienced, a topic that remains largely unaddressed in the existing literature. By building on original archival research and the specialized work of the epoch, this article traces the main conditions, the means of tackling diseases, the remedies that were specifically local or those found within the European repertoire. It also sheds light on the support that the administrative apparatus offered to the troops, namely medical care in its material form (hospitals, quarantines, pharmacies, medicine, monetary assistance) and human form (the personnel hired at the borders: military doctors, surgeons, midwives, veterinarians). This article concludes that the entire correspondence from the center directed at the local authorities in Banat and vice versa reflects in a unique and subtle way the level of medical knowledge of the time.