Page:The Armed Forces Institute of Pathology-ItsFirstCentury.djvu/273

PATHOLOGY WORLDWIDE the case of soldiers serving in Alaska who died unexpectedly and inexplicably, insofar as the local medical officer could determine. Autopsy tissues sent to the Institute indicated that death was due to severe damage to the liver following inhalation of a toxic vapor. Investigation revealed that the soldiers had used a cleaning fluid containing carbon tetrachloride to clean weapons. A directive- was issued promptly to discontinue the use of the fluid indoors, and pathologists in the field were alerted to the danger of its use in confined quarters. From such instruction, Army pathologists were enabled to explain the previously undetermined causes of death among crews of allied submarines which docked at Pacific ports. Studies of autopsy tissues revealed characteristic lesions, and investigation showed that the sailors had used toxic cleaning solutions within the close confines of submarines. Along with the work on specimens received through military channels, went the work done under the direction of the American Registry of Pathology, through which materials of pathological interest arising in civil life were analyzed and studied. On account of wartime pressures, both upon the staff and the cooperating civilian physicians, the followup system had to be suspended for the duration of the war, and there was some slackening in the registration of tissues and clinical records contributed from this source. Interest in the registries continued, however. Five new registries were added during the war, bringing the total number to 13. The total number of accessions received by the Museum-Institute from this source by the end of the war had grown to more than 48,ooo. 26

While the study of pathology was the principal business of the Museum- Institute, it still was but part. Closely related was the graphic representation of the results of such study through the media of drawings and paintings, photography and photomicrography, and plastic medical art — all comprising the Army Medical Illustration Service (fig. 80).

This Service included the Photographic Laboratory which, in an average month, turned out from its collection of 100,000 negatives of medical interest as many as 2,500 prints, prepared i,oco colored lantern slides, and made more than 2,500 photostats and 25,000 offset prints. Not all of this work, by any