Journal of - International Society for the History of Islamic Medicine

The American Hospital in Gaziantep, The History of the
Connected Medical School and Nursing School and Their
Effects on Their Environment
Gülkızılca YÜRÜR
İstanbul University Faculty of Medicine, Department of Deontology and History of Medicine
e-mail: kizilca2002@yahoo.com
Summary
Starting in the mid 1870s until the I World War, the American Protestant Missonary Organisation ABCFM opened a medical school, a hospital and
a school for nursing in Antep. In this study, the workings of the ABCFM missionaries in Antep in the field of medicine are presented and their effects
on this city are shortly discussed. The ABCFM missionaries active in the field of medicine played a role in the acceptance of the approaches and methods
of modern medicine in the region. The hospital triggered the establishment of other institutions of modern medicine in the city. Training professionals
of modern medicine, alongside with the Beirut American University, they can be counted among the actors of a cultural transformation in the field
of healing, in Southern Anatolia and northern Mesopotamia. Evaluating the personal contributions of the ABCFM’s missionary doctors, together
with the structural features of the ABCFM work in Antep, may help to understand the influences which led to the emergence of a need for modern medical
services in Anatolia.
Key Words: Medical missionaries, medical education, Gaziantep
Covering the period between 1793 to 1810, the socalled
“Second Great Revival” in the USA describes a significant
increase in the membership to religious communities,
growing social interest in religious gatherings and a
strong enthusiasm about supporting religious institutions
(1). The most succesful missionary organisation in the history
of the USA, American Board of Commissioners for Foreign
Missions (ABCFM), was founded during this period.
Founded in 1812 by the graduates of the Congregasionalist
Williams College, the ABCFM sent missionaries to the
Cherokee Indians in Tennessee, then to India, Sri Lanka,
Hawaii Islands, China, Singapur and Thailand. While the
missionary field expanded all the way from Africa to the
Far East, the Ottoman Empire, China and India stood out
as regions with big investments in money and staff (1).
Besides religious education, the ABCFM was conscious
about the advantages of providing its missionary staff with
practical skills and missionary candidates with a training
in medicine, agriculture and mechanical engineering were
especially preferred. In some cases, even a short medical
education was on the training agenda (2).
In the early times of missionary activity, the primary
duty of medical missionaries was to take care of the health
of the missionaries working on the field. However, in time,
ABCFM laid greater importance on the role of medical services
in building connections with local populations (3). It
was among the goals of the protestant missionaries to transform
ancient religious structures, power constellations and
cultures in India, China and the Ottoman Empire, where
well-rooted regimes ruled. The paradigm and practices of
modern medicine served well to shatter the “old orders” (4).
The American Board missionaries started their activities
in the Ottoman Empire in 1820 (5). Concentrating on
educational work and on opening up institutions of modern
education, the missionaries also sent children of families
embracing the Protestant faith to receive education in
the USA. Activities in the field of health care started after
the efforts in providing modern education. The first medical
missionary of the ABCFM in the Ottoman Empire was
Dr. Asa Dodge, who started his work in Beirut in 1833. He
was followed by a small army of doctors and nurses spreading
all over anatolia and the Middle East (6).
The ABCFM had three mission districts in the Ottoman
lands. Those were the Western Turkey Mission, the Eastern
Turkey Mission and the central Turkey Mission. Besides
these geographical divisions, missions aiming at certain ethnicities
such as the Nasturian Mission or the Bulgarian Mission
have been formed and dissolved in time. Within the dis-
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ISHIM 2011-2012