After hospital treatment in England or Scotland the men are sent to convalescent homes in Ramsgate, Herne Bay, Whitstable, Sturry, Brighton, or any of the hundred and one other points that are suitable in the British Isles. Later these men are sent before medical boards which decide as to their disposal thereafter. They may be sent directly back to duty; to prolonged rest; to have some weeks, P.T.--physical training--which is not popular with the men, but is often needed; or, they may be marked P.B.--permanent base duty--which means that they are not fit for general service, but are able to perform some duties at the base or at home. Lastly, they may be discharged as permanently unfit for further service, the amount of their pensions being decided by the pension board.
Until the wounded man reaches the C.C.S. his wounds are dressed in very rough surroundings, not the aseptic dressing rooms of peace times. Dugouts, cellars or open trenches are employed for dressing stations. After the battle of Vimy Ridge my boys and I dressed our men for four days in an open, muddy trench, with the shells dropping about all the time. Dugouts are simply holes in the ground, and may be most primitive dressing rooms. Everyone knows how aseptic the ordinary cellar could be made, even with the greatest care on the part of an M.O.'s assistants. But our dressings are folded and wrapped in such a manner that they can be applied, even though the dresser's hands are covered with mud, without the aseptic part of the dressing, which is applied to the wound, being in any way soiled. I have given one hundred and fifty inoculations hypodermically for the prevention of typhoid in a tent in which the men and myself stood ankle deep in mud. Not one case of infection of the point at which the needle was inserted occurred. This illustrates the efficiency one reaches from being accustomed to working in filthy surroundings. Your stretcher bearers and dressers become as skilled in this art as yourself, so that the men really get good attention in spite of the many difficulties in the way. Of course, at the C.C.S., which is five to ten miles from the trenches, the surroundings are as good as they are in the average city hospital. And the base hospitals are often elaborate in their equipment, though they may be situated in large tents or newly constructed wooden huts with stoves to lessen the raw cold of the French winter weather. The base hospitals in England are the highly scientific city hospitals, simply put under military control.