This book describes the injuries and maladies which affected the Australian armed forces during the war 1939-1945. It is not a text-book, nor a military manual: in the main it is not highly technical, in fact the conditions it records closely concern the civil community. Although it is primarily compiled for members of the medical profession it should also be within the scope of those interested in the repair of the sick and the unfit. The size of the various chapters depends chiefly on the importance of the subjects from the Australian viewpoint; the longest deals with malaria, which might easily have negated military planning and valour in the South-West Pacific.

Such a book is in a sense a period piece; it stops short at the end of the war, and therefore it reflects the views current in that period, but while suffering from some limitations of knowledge thereby, gains from many advances made.
The work described herein covers all circumstances, ranging from first-rate facilities in base hospitals to the more restricted environment of medical units in the field and the necessitous extemporisations of the prison camps.

pp. 726 #101025