The Aerochir: the first "flying hospital"

The concept of providing light and far-forward mobile surgical support teams to care for battle casualties is being increasingly adopted by most NATO nations as a result of military and political-economic considerations. Similar considerations led to the design of a mobile surgical hospital capable of flying a surgical team and all its equipment to a location of need as early as 1919. Unlike many of the early attempts to fuse medicine and aviation, the Nemirovsky-Tilmant Aerochir was not a dead-end. It served as a proof-of-concept product which led to the development and adoption of the Breguet "Aerochir," which was used in French colonial wars of the 1920s, and eventually led to adoption of the concept of air-mobile far-forward surgical care by many of the world's militaries. This design from over 80 yr ago, along with its creators, should be remembered and honored by those of us involved in providing aeromedical support to battlefield casualties.