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"World War, 1914-1918 Veterans Medical care United States History 20th century."
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Burdens of War : Creating the United States Veterans Health System
\"During and after World War I, policy makers, soldiers, and veterans laid the groundwork for the extension of government-sponsored medical care to millions of former service members. In the process, they built a pillar of the American welfare state. Legislation and rehabilitation plans formulated shortly after the U.S. entered the Great War aimed to minimize the government's long-term obligations to veterans, but within a decade, those who had served gained conditional access to their own direct assistance agency and a national system of hospitals. Burdens of War explains why that drastic transition occurred, and how one group of citizens won the right to obtain publicly funded health services. The story of the early roots of service-related health policies has a variety of larger implications. It shows how veterans' welfare shifted from centering on pension and domicile care programs rooted in the nineteenth century to the provision of access to direct medical services; how shifting ideals about hospitals and medical care influenced policy at the dusk of the Progressive Era; how race, class, and gender shaped the health-related experiences of soldiers, veterans, and caregivers; and how interest groups capitalized on a tense political and social climate to bring about change. On a general level, an examination of the roots of a nationwide veterans' hospital system demonstrates how privileges were won in the twentieth-century United States. It reveals a moment of state expansion, but also illustrates the wider tendency of the U.S. government to award entitlements selectively. The policies that paved the way for the advent of a veterans' medical system thus deserve to be considered as foundational in the development and shape of the American welfare state.\"--Provided by publisher.
Book
Constructing Disability after the Great War
As Americans--both civilians and veterans--worked to determine the meanings of identity for blind veterans of World War I, they bound cultural constructs of blindness to all the emotions and contingencies of mobilizing and fighting the war, and healing from its traumas. Sighted Americans’ wartime rehabilitation culture centered blind soldiers and veterans in a mix of inspirational stories. Veterans worked to become productive members of society even as ableism confined their unique life experiences to a collection of cultural tropes that suggested they were either downcast wrecks of their former selves or were morally superior and relatively flawless as they overcame their disabilities and triumphantly journeyed toward successful citizenship. Sullivan investigates the rich lives of blind soldiers and veterans and their families to reveal how they confronted barriers, gained an education, earned a living, and managed their self-image while continually exposed to the public’s scrutiny of their success and failures.
eBook
War's waste : rehabilitation in World War I America
With U.S. soldiers stationed around the world and engaged in multiple conflicts, Americans will be forced for the foreseeable future to come to terms with those permanently disabled in battle. At the moment, we accept rehabilitation as the proper social and cultural response to the wounded, swiftly returning injured combatants to their civilian lives. But this was not always the case, as the author reveals in this book. In it, she explains how, before entering World War I, the United States sought a way to avoid the enormous cost of providing injured soldiers with pensions, which it had done since the Revolutionary War. Emboldened by their faith in the new social and medical sciences, reformers pushed rehabilitation as a means to \"rebuild\" disabled soldiers, relieving the nation of a monetary burden and easing the decision to enter the Great War. The author's narrative moves from the professional development of orthopedic surgeons and physical therapists to the curative workshops, or hospital spaces where disabled soldiers learned how to repair automobiles as well as their own artificial limbs. The story culminates in the postwar establishment of the Veterans Administration, one of the greatest legacies to come out of the First World War.
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Burdens of War
How have Americans grappled with the moral and financial issues of veterans' health care?
In the World War I era, veterans fought for a unique right: access to government-sponsored health care. In the process, they built a pillar of American social policy. Burdens of War explores how the establishment of the veterans' health system marked a reimagining of modern veterans' benefits and signaled a pathbreaking validation of the power of professionalized institutional medical care.
Adler reveals that a veterans' health system came about incrementally, amid skepticism from legislators, doctors, and army officials concerned about the burden of long-term obligations, monetary or otherwise, to ex-service members. She shows how veterans' welfare shifted from centering on pension and domicile care programs rooted in the nineteenth century to direct access to health services. She also traces the way that fluctuating ideals about hospitals and medical care influenced policy at the dusk of the Progressive Era; how race, class, and gender affected the health-related experiences of soldiers, veterans, and caregivers; and how interest groups capitalized on a tense political and social climate to bring about change.
The book moves from the 1910s—when service members requested better treatment, Congress approved new facilities and increased funding, and elected officials expressed misgivings about who should have access to care—to the 1930s, when the economic crash prompted veterans to increasingly turn to hospitals for support while bureaucrats, politicians, and doctors attempted to rein in the system. By the eve of World War II, the roots of what would become the country's largest integrated health care system were firmly planted and primed for growth. Drawing readers into a critical debate about the level of responsibility America bears for wounded service members, Burdens of War is a unique and moving case study.
eBook