Renkioi: a forgotten Crimean War hospital and its significance

Renkioi Civil Hospital was built late in the Crimean War (1854-6) in Turkey on the Dardanelles. Designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel, its prefabricated structure was a brilliant engineering innovation. As a civil hospital for military patients, it was staffed by experienced civilian doctors, thereby relieving the shortage of military doctors. Renkioi is remembered as an astonishing early prefabricated structure. However the war was soon to end and it was never used to near capacity. Thus, its other successful features are largely forgotten. It demonstrated the advantages of a doctors, rather than a military officer, being in complete command of a hospital and this was later accepted by the army. Renkioi also showed how infection could be reduced by able staff in a well administered, properly designed hospital with good sanitation. After the war, Dr. Edmund Parkes, its Medical Superintendent, became the first Professor of Hygiene at the new Army Medical School, ensuring that "the prevention of disease and the promotion of health" became the first function of the Army Medical Services.