A History of Australian Navy Health Sailor Uniforms and Ranks (Part 2)

A History of Australian Navy Health Sailor Uniforms and Ranks (Part 2) Commander Neil Westphalen, Royal Australian Navy Reserve  Purpose More than a century after its establishment, many Royal Australian Navy (RAN) uniforms and ranks still reflect those used by the (British) Royal Navy (RN).The first of this three-part article described the history of Navy […]

Command versus technical authority: lessons from the 2nd General Health Battalion

MC Reade, C Flint, S Kennaway, N Duff, B McCall Introduction Historically, military medical units were commanded by senior doctors. All of the renowned hospitals that form the heritage of the ADF had medical commanders: for example, Colonel Thomas Henry Fiaschi of the 3rd Australian General Hospital at Lemnos; Lieutenant Colonel Wilfred Giblin of the […]

Primary Health Care in the ADF

Commander Neil Westphalen, Royal Australian Navy Reserve Introduction This article follows a previous paper by the author regarding occupational and environmental medicine in the ADF.1 The previous paper asserts that high rates of preventable workplace illness and injury indicate the need to improve the management of the occupational and environmental hazards associated with ADF workplaces, […]

Would That White Coat Were Purple

Wing Commander Tony Austin RAAF A traditional Chinese curse goes something like this: ‘May you live in interesting times’. If it be so, then we are all most certainly cursed for those are indeed very interesting times. Economic reality has hit the military hard the buzz word for the 90’s is ‘downsizing’ and the military […]