Entries - Entry Category: Pathology - Starting with H

Hookworm disease was a significant public health issue in Arkansas until the movement to eradicate hookworms in the early twentieth century. With official estimates claiming that up to twenty percent of the entire population of the state suffered from hookworm infestation, this parasite was sufficiently widespread to affect the economy as well as the health of Arkansas. Its virtual eradication was the result of a public health and education campaign on the part of the Rockefeller Sanitary Commission between 1910 and 1914. The hookworm is an intestinal parasite that grows and reproduces in the intestines of its hosts. When infected people deposit feces containing hookworm eggs in warm, moist, shaded soil, the eggs hatch and develop into larvae. Within five …

In the early months of 1895, Hot Springs (Garland County) suffered through a blizzard, numerous fires, and a smallpox outbreak. These collective disasters left the community economically crippled. The Blizzard of 1895 that swept across much of the country in late January/early February had made travel to the spa resort town impossible during what was normally its busy season. By mid-February, travel had resumed, and visitors soon filled up the town. Then, a series of unexplained fires started flaring up across the city, culminating in a large conflagration in the early hours of Friday, February 22. The fire started around 3:30 a.m. and, within minutes, it had engulfed four and a half blocks of businesses and residential buildings while thousands …

The first human dissection performed in Arkansas is commemorated by an obelisk located at the edge of MacArthur Park in Little Rock (Pulaski County). In 1927, the Arkansas Medical Society unveiled the marker, whose inscription states that the dissection was held on that spot in November 1874. To clarify: the monument honors the state’s first such legal event, and the unveiling took place on May 13, despite the marker being dated May 12. Following appeals by doctors, in April 1873 the Arkansas General Assembly passed Act 45 authorizing “dissection in certain cases for the advancement of science.” This paved the way for the establishment of a medical school, as the new law gave both doctors and medical students the right …