Feldshers and Feldsherism

Abstract

A LONG overdue debate is emerging in the United States on the role in health-care services of personnel trained not as physicians but in other professional roles. A few recent examples are analyses of the current or projected role of the nurse,^{1 , 2} the social worker,³ the midwife,^{4 , 5} the military eorpsman⁶ and the "physician's assistant."^{7 , 8} Highly relevant to this debate is the long experience of the Soviet Union — and, previously, of Russia — with a special kind of medical person: the feldsher.The US-USSR Health Exchange Program, a part of the US-USSR Cultural Exchange Agreement, gave me the opportunity to . . .