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Hospital records as source material for African historical studies: C.M.S. Mengo Hospital case notes and admission register

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 April 2022

Jan Kuhanen
Jan Kuhanen*
Affiliation:
University of Joensuu, Department of History
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Extract

For a historian interested in African medical and social history it is difficult to imagine a more interesting and exciting source material than authentic hospital documents and records. Sources such as these are not always available or readily accessible to researchers. Hospital records dating from the nineteenth century are quite rare in Africa, and the use of more modern and contemporary records, because of their intimacy, is often restricted by legislation. For these reasons the documentary material stored at hospitals has rarely been used as source material by social, medical and demographic historians. Nevertheless, one collection of hospital documents with relatively easy access for researchers is the C.M.S. Mengo Hospital Case Notes and Admission Registers located in the Sir Albert Cook Medical Library at Mulago, Kampala, Uganda.

Type
Articles
Information
African Research and Documentation , Volume 85 , 2001 , pp. 15 - 24
Copyright
Copyright © International African Institute 2001

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References

References

1. Iliffe (1998) and Foster (1970) have referred to this collection but only indirectly.Google Scholar
2. Cook, A.R., Cook, J.H., Cook, E.N., Report of the Medical Sub-Conference, undated 1909. Mengo Hospital: Copy letters from Dr. A.R. Cook, Mengo, to C.M.S. London: 1909-12, 1916, 1917, 1921 (MH/A). Albert Cook Medical Library (ACML).Google Scholar
3. Foster, V.D., The early history of scientific medicine in Uganda. Nairobi, East African Literature Bureau, 1970, p. 59.Google Scholar
4. See Worboys, Michael, ‘Tropical diseases’, pp. 518–524, in Companion encyclopedia of the history of medicine, Vol. 1, eds. Bynum, W.F. & Porter, R.. London, Routledge, 1994.Google Scholar
5. For example, there has been some dispute about the extent, causes, and nature of syphilis in Uganda. See Vaughan, Megan, ‘Syphilis in Colonial East and Central Africa: The Social Construction of the Epidemic’, Epidemics and Ideas, eds. Ranger, T. & Slack, P., Cambridge University Press, 1992, pp. 296–302; J.N.P. Davies, “The History of Syphilis in Uganda’, Bulletin of the World Health Organisation, Vol. 15, 1956, pp. 1041-55; J. Orley, ‘Concepts of Infectious Disease amongst the Rural Ganda - with Special Reference to Yaws and Syphilis’, Nkanga: Special Edition on Medicine and Social Sciences in East and West Africa, ed. F.J. Bennet, MISR Publishing Unit, Kampala 1973, pp. 60-66.Google Scholar
6. Mengo Hospital (MH) 1898/1, case 139, 15 March 1898. Albert Cook Medical Library (ACML).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
7. MH 1899/2,11 Oct. 1899. ACML.Google Scholar
8. MH 1898/1, case 215, undated 1898. ACML.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
9. MH 1899/2, 3 Oct. 1899. ACMLGoogle Scholar
10. MH 1900, case 160, 19 Oct. 1900. ACML.Google Scholar
11. See Bongaarts, John, ‘Does Malnutrition Affect Fecundity? A Summary of Evidence’, Science, Vol. 208, May 1980, pp. 564-9.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
12. MH 1904/2 case 266, 2 April 1904. ACML.Google Scholar
13. MH 1904/2 case358, 20 May 1904. ACML.Google Scholar
14. MH 1909/3 case 477,11 April 1909. ACML.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

Bibliography

Unpublished documentary sources C.M.S. Mengo Hospital (MH) case notes 1897-1944. Sir Albert Cook Medical Library (ACML), Mulago, Kampala.Google Scholar
C.M.S. MH Admission Register Books 1903-1927. ACML.Google Scholar
Mengo Hospital. Copy letters from Dr. Albert Cook, Mengo, to C.M.S. London: 1909-12, 1916, 1917, 1921 (MH/A). ACML.Google Scholar
Published sources Bongaarts, John, ‘Does malnutrition affect fecundity? A summary of evidence’, Science, 208, May 1980.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Davies, J.N.P., “The history of syphilis in Uganda’, Bulletin of the World Health Organisation, 15, 1956, 1041–1055.Google ScholarPubMed
Foster, V.D., Early history of scientific medicine in Uganda, Nairobi, East African Literature Bureau, 1970.Google Scholar
Iliffe, John, East African doctors. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1998.Google Scholar
Orley, J., ‘Concepts of infectious disease amongst the rural Ganda - with special reference to yaws and syphilis’, pp. 6–66 in Nkanga: special edition on medicine and social sciences in East and West Africa, ed. Bennet, F.J., Kampala, MISR Publishing Unit, 1973.Google Scholar
Vaughan, Megan, ‘Syphilis in colonial East and Central Africa: the social construction of the epidemic’, pp. 269–302 in Epidemics and Ideas, ed. Ranger, T. & Slack, P.. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1992.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Worboys, Michael, ‘Tropical diseases’, pp. 512–536 in Companion encyclopedia of the history of medicine, Vol. 1, ed. Bynum, W.F. & Porter, R.. London, Routledge, 1994.Google Scholar