Medical Staff a Mistake ?
- Esprit
- Jan 9, 2017
- 2 min read
This is the medical staff, right? So naturally its origins should have something to do with medicine...
If that is what you thought you are not alone and it may come as a surprise to you that what most of us have come to know as the origin of the medical staff is actually not related to medicine at all. How could this happen? Who is to blame? Well, it is due to an honest mistake made many years ago when a medical officer in the army was given the task of selecting a symbol for the medical corp.
It was the early 20th century and Captain Reynolds of the U.S. Army Medical Corps believed the symbol was commonly used by the European army medical corp although it was not(the staff of Asclepius or Christian imagery was actually what was commonly used), and with this reasoning wanted the caduceus (which is actually the staff of Hermes the Greek god of commerce) to be the symbol of the US Army medical corps. His request was first denied by the surgeon general but later it was approved by the surgeon general's successor. In Captain Reynolds proposal he mistakenly referred to the rod as the "rod of Asclepius" Asclepius is the Greek hero and god of medicine, his staff only has one snake on a wooden staff. Later the insignia was brought into question within the pages of the military surgeons about its confused origins and whether or not it should be kept but an argument was made stating "the Caduceus’ ancient use in designating neutrality amongst noncombatants" and because of this still to this day the Caduceus is widely known as the medical staff in the US.
When I was a kid one of my favorite pass times as Greek mythology and spending time in museums which are what prompted me to look into this quite some time ago which is when I stumbled across this interesting anecdote and I thought I would share it with all of you. I have linked to a website that further explains the history of the medical staff and its importance or rather interesting ties to the history of medicine.
As always good luck on your journey and I look forward to seeing the progress you all make on your journeys in the days weeks and months to come.
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