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The founder of the Vienna School of Ophthalmology was Prof. Dr. Georg Joseph Beer, who founded the First University Eye Clinic in the Vienna General Hospital in 1812. Prof. Ferdinand von Arlt led it for 27 years from 1856 to 1883. As the First Eye Clinic became too small, the Second University Eye Clinic was founded in 1883 at the same hospital in Vienna. Since 1885 it had been led for 30 years by Prof. Ernst Fuchs. Many well-known ophthalmologists were leading those Viennese eye clinics. However, Arlt and Fuchs were the main representatives of the Vienna School of Ophthalmology, which was always characterised by the high standards in the diagnosis and therapy of eye diseases. Many Croatian ophthalmologists were educated by them or their students, and later they established eye departments in the major cities in Croatia and transmitted acquired knowledge and experience. The first eye departments in Croatia were formed at the turn of the 19th and 20th century. The First University Eye Clinic in Croatia started to work in Zagreb in 1923. Our ophthalmologists transmitted the organisation of the clinics as they existed in Vienna, and that was the matrix form of all European clinics at that time. Therefore, the tradition of the Vienna School of Ophthalmology was passed on to the next generations. The paper also gives short biographies of Viennese and Croatian ophthalmologists and their mutual relations in education and work.

The article describes the oldest locations and buildings for the treatment of patients in Rijeka. According to historical sources, the first known site for health care and treatment was a hospital founded in the 14th or 15th century in the Old Town, in the St Sebastian Street, in which also existed a little church of the same name. It is not known for sure when the hospital was moved to a new location, to a house opposite the Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The Statute of Rijeka from 1530 mentions it under the name Hospital of St. Mary (hospitali Sanctae Mariae) but later changed its name to St. Spirit Hospital. It was named after the chapel located in the same block of buildings. As in the previous location, there was an orphanage and an almshouse within the hospital. The hospital and the orphanage operated in this building until 1822, when, at the initiative of the Municipality, they moved to Brajda, in an adapted complex of buildings of the former wax factory. The building of the former hospital has been adapted for residential use. At the end of World War II, the building was destroyed under aerial bombardment and later a new building was built in its place.

Medicine and physicians in Dubrovnik during the last two centuries, i.e. in the period after the dissolution of the Republic of Dubrovnik by Napoleon's Army, have attracted less interest among medical historians. In this paper, the lives and medical careers of two physicians from Dubrovnik, father and son, Baldo and Ante Bibica, have been reconstructed from the end of the nineteenth and the first half of the twentieth century by searching through the contemporary medical journals and newspapers as well as private archives of the members of family Bibica. Baldo Bibica graduated medicine in Vienna and spent the whole professional life as a municipal physician, at first, in the places in the vicinity of Dubrovnik and from 1903 in Gruž. Ante Bibica studied medicine in Graz and in Zagreb to become the first person from Dubrovnik promoted at the School of Medicine, Zagreb University. He specialized in dermatovenereology in Vienna and worked, as a specialist, in Dubrovnik. They both were active in the professional medical societies (at local and national levels) and were influential in the social life in Dubrovnik.

The health of officers (as well as the entire army) is exposed to additional risks due to the performance of various life-threatening tasks for the needs of the state. Therefore, it is not unusual for the state to take care of the health of its officers (as well as the army) through a system of Vojvodina medical care or specialised society through the construction of military or officer health resorts [Militärkurhaus / Offizierskurhaus] with the provision of medical/ health services. The subject of this paper is the relationship between architecture and the provision of military-medical services of officer/military health resorts built by the Society of the White Cross [Gesellschaft vom Weißen Kreuze] in Kvarner at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century. The research is based on data collected from Austrian architectural, medical and tourist magazines and yearbooks of Austrian Society of the White Cross. The results of the research contribute to a better understanding of the improvement of the health of officers, the development of the architecture of health buildings [Kurhaus] and the entire history of medicine and health tourism in the Croatian Adriatic.

Born in Istria, then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Fran Mandić (1851-1924) finished a Croatian grammar school in Rijeka and studied medicine in Graz, Austria and in Prague, Bohemia. After graduation, he settled in Trieste, a major Austrian port, where he spent his entire career. After a period in the State Hospital in Trieste, Mandić ran his own practice and held a position of medical adviser of the Austrian State Railway in Istria. Since his student days, he had championed equal political rights for the Croatian people in Istria. Aware of the importance of education, he donated his time and money for a number of new schools to open throughout Istria. For his merits he received high honours from the Emperor and an honorary Citizenship of Opatija, but the greatest recognition was the respect he earned from his patients and their families.

The authors were interested in the lectures' themes, organisation, the course, and the accompanied activities at the balneology congress in Opatija in 1904. The congress was organised by the principle of the health resort at the time Professor Dr Julius Glax, and consisted of two separate parts. The first part was held in Opatija from October 13 until 15, 1904. There were lectures, auto-papers, summaries, reports, discussions, and the afternoon expert trip to Crikvenica by boat. In Opatija the participants were shown the spa park, the rehabilitation paths for patients with heart difficulties, marine baths Angiolona and Slatina, the covered spa Erzherzog Ludwig Viktor Bad, and of the health institution Zander Institute. At the accompanying exhibition the Austrian and German companies represented their products, among them still recognised Bayer, C. Reichert in Karl Zeiß. Additionally, the owner of the Zanderinstitut in Opatija Dr Isor Stein presented his own therapeutic aid exerciteur there. The first part of the congress concluded on October 15, 1904 with the great banquet in the hotel Stephanie.The second part of the congress was held from October 16 until 20, 1904. The expert trip was organised to the Austrian Riviera on the Pannonia ship. The participants visited attractions and health institutions in Mali Lošinj, Pula, Brijuni, Rovinj, Grado, Aquileia and Trieste, where they also had expert lectures. The closing ceremony of the second part of the congress was in Trieste, from where the participants returned to Vienna by the special train.

Dr Valentin Lucas was born in Labin on 19 March 1873. His ancestors moved to Labin from Gora (near Labin) in the 17th century. Valentin was a common name in his family. His family was well known for having many well educated members including lawyers, doctors, and priests. The last member of their family was Giacomo who committed suicide few years after the Second World War. According to now known facts, we can say that Dr Valen Lucas was the first doctor in Rijeka who specialised in gynaecology, obstetrics and venereology, with the reputation and knowledge from working in Trieste and Vienna. In Rijeka he established his private practice that was visited by patients of different social backgrounds, which we can find in Dr Valentin Lucas' medical records. Just before Ester in 1909, he accepted a job offer as a one year substitute for Dr Manzini, who was a police-doctor for Harbour Master's Office in Pula. Pula by that time had already established an image of a strategic military Austrian-Hungarian port. In hope for a better life thousands of residents moved to already overpopulatedPula. As their new environment could not render their hopes, many were drawn to refuge in immorality and women in prostitution. Dr Lucas had been fighting against prostitution in Pula, especially against secret prostitution, because that was one of his main goals as a doctor. Though his task was not easy, because there were no organised sanitary and administrative services for that popular social deviation. He died in Labin on 18 February 1932.

Plague was one of the most deadly epidemic diseases of the Baroque period. Responses to it were not only medical, but religious as well. A good example of the latter is the Most Holy Trinity monument in the city of Osijek, which was in the 18th century the biggest town of the Kingdom of Slavonia and today is the regional centre in the Republic of Croatia. The monument was erected between 1729 and 1730 on the main square of the Osijek military fortress Tvrđa by the widow of the General Maksimilijan Petraš who died during the 1728 plague epidemic. Inscription on it implores the mercy of God as a protection against plague. Its foundation could be also interpreted as a part of the Catholic Revival, which was implemented by the Habsburgs in Osijek and Slavonia after their liberation from the Ottomans. But although, on the one hand, it could be interpreted as a symbol of the successful implementation of the Habsburg unifying religious policies due to its strong resemblance with the similar columns throughout the Habsburg Monarchy, on the other hand, it represented a continuation of the theurgic understanding of medicine, which could be interpreted as the failure of the Habsburg enlightened medical policies. Thus the archival documents from the Osijek State Archive together with the Osijek plague column itself were analysed with the aim of explaining the above mentioned ambiguities.

The article describes how the system of medical care for wounded soldiers in Rijeka during the First World War was organized. In the Austro-Hungarian Empire the hospital care for sick and wounded soldiers, except of a military health care, was under the exclusive jurisdiction of the Red Cross. The Municipal Committee of the Hungarian Red Cross in Rijeka, established in 1881, renewed its previously suspended activity in August 1914, with the task of starting a war hospital for wounded soldiers. For this purpose, the former Hotel for emigrants, a large modern building opened in 1908, was converted. It became the center of hospital care for wounded soldiers in the city. Also, under the supervision of the Red Cross in Rijeka several smaller auxiliary dispensaries were organized. The other city health care facilities and the most of the physicians in Rijeka were included in the care for the wounded. The head of the volunteer nurses of the Red Cross was the president of the Red Cross in Rijeka, Countess Sofia Wickenburg, the wife of the governor and at the same time the president of the Red Cross city branch. The medical staff in Rijeka was particularly noted for its successful and rapid suppression of a typhus epidemic in February and March 1915. The paper is based on research of archival funds in the State Archives in Rijeka and part of the Rijeka and Zagreb press.

Since 1850 the town of Pola (today Pula, Croatia) underwent big changes and growth due to its transformation into the principal military port of Austrian-Hungarian Empire. Besides the Admiralty that governed the naval actions, the harbor was supported by different organizations needed for normal functioning of the harbor. One of this organizations was Naval Technical Committee (Marine Technisches Komitee), founded in 1874 with the purpose of solving the technical and technological issues related to the navy. The outbreak of World War I (WWI) posed new challenges for Europe. Thus, on February 29th 1916, the Hygienic Institute was founded in the harbor area and Dr. Karl Cafasso was appointed as the first director. The purpose of the Institute was to provide scientific and professional aid to the Head of the Medical Corps of the Ports' Board (Kriegs-Hafenkommando) in the field of epidemiology, microbiology, social medicine and hygiene, the main fields of public health even today. By the end of the war, the Institute ceased its activity, and similar was founded only in 1938, under Italian rule and has been developed to the present Institute of Public Health.

In this paper is presented the first original document of the delivery of conjoined twins on the territory of the present-day Vojvodina. The document number 1224 consists of two handwritten quires. On the first page of the first quire are a description and a drawing of the delivered twins. The delivery was described and drawn by Dr. Ernest Furjaković, a shire physician in Ruma and the secondary physicus of the Srem County, who attended and handled the delivery. The conjoined twins were delivered in the night between 2 and 3 April 1852 in Mali Radinci, a small village in the Srem County nearby Ruma, in the far south of the Habsburg Monarchy. The twins, preserved in alcohol, were sent to Budapest to the professor of anatomy "for the purposes of medical science", as he wrote in the report. The second quire of the same document refers to the proof that the Commissariat in Ruma forwarded the doctor's report to the High Land Government in Timisoara. In the introduction, the authors displayed the known facts on the occurrence of conjoined twins in the world, which were used to compare with the described case. The data refer to the incidence of conjoined twins in the population, theory of its embryonic origin, their classification, treatment in cases of diagnosed pregnancy and the manner of their delivery. They also refer to the procedures of modern diagnostics, the possibilities of their surgical disjoin and related ethical questions. After that comes a part of the work dedicated to the analysis of the shown document, and the comparison of the several cases of the most significant conjoined twins in the world with these from Srem, as the authors named them. The authors showed short biography of the physician who delivered them, as well. At the end, they conclude that this work gives the first description of document of the delivery of the first known conjoined twins on the territory of the present-day Vojvodina.

Red Cross Hospital in Krapina, during the First World War, was active from 1914 to 1918. Hospital led by Dr. Mirko Crkvenac, oriented humanist. The hospital is operated thanks to the help of municipalities and citizens. The hospital staff concern is for civilian and military victims of the First World War. Dr. Crkvenac, with the support of the City of Krapina and Mayor Vilibald Sluga, he succeeds to the organization and operation of the hospital to an enviable level. Across the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Croatian, Hospitals Red Cross, had a significant role in caring for the wounded, injured and sick soldiers and civilians. Red Cross Hospital in Krapina, is an example of a well-organized hospital in the toughest conditions. Such an organization was not simple in its implementation, and left the valuable lessons and experience.

In the 1860s, the medical societies in Habsburg Monarchy, undertook a part of the medical postgraduate training. Doctors and wound surgeons from Ljubljana established medical association in October 1861 («Ärztlicher Leseverein in Laibach»). At a meeting in October 1862 they decided to include all the doctors and wound surgeons from the Carniola region. Following the organization was renamed Medical Association in Carniola («Verein der Ärzte in Krain»). A similar provincial association was founded by the Styrian doctors in Graz as early as in May 1862 («Verein der Ärzte in Steiermark»). Similar medical associations were also established in the Lower Styria in the 1870s. The most important medical association was established in Maribor in 1876. Another medical association was established in Celje in 1877 and one in the Ptuj-Ljutomer region in 1877. As the associations were mostly communicating in German, this might have been the reason for the establishment of the Slovene medical society in Celje in 1906. The Slovenian national consciousness began to strengthen across the territory of today's Slovenia. Already after the First World War in 1918, they managed to achieve the establishment of the Slovene Medical Society. Due to the events during the Second World War, a uniform Slovene medical association was established in 1947.

The new main military hospital building in Bjelovar, built in 1900-1901, was designed to provide full medical services to its patients, as it had patient rooms for soldiers and officers, doctor's office, a pharmacy, a laboratory, a kitchen with a dining room, toilet facilities, and storage for food and firewood in the basement. The building's right wing accommodated regimental doctors on the ground floor. The first floor had patient rooms with sanitary facilities and rooms for paramedics. In the hospital park there was a separate building for infectious diseases, auxiliary buildings, a disinfection facility, and a mortuary. For 35 years before World War 2, it had functioned as a military hospital with brief intervals when it provided services to the general public and outpatients. During the War it resumed its primary function and continued providing health care for the military until it was demolished in the late 1970s. This article is a contribution to the existing literature about military health care in Croatia, as there have been no earlier records about the Bjelovar hospital.

When reporting on extreme weather conditions in the city of Rijeka (former Fiume), it is often specified " ... since the beginning of measurements in 1948". In reality the modern meteorological measurements in Fiume had started already in 1868, when the Austrian Imperial Academy of Science established the meteorological station. The station was operating at the Naval Academy, under the supervision of prof. dr. Emil Stahlberger, the first university professor of physics in Fiume (Rijeka). The following year the station was equipped with mareograph (marigraph/tide gauge). Based on three years measurements, prof. Stahlberger published the first book on tides in the Rijeka bay (Ueber die Ebbe und Flut in der Rhede von Fiume). After his sudden death, Prof. Peter Salcher, his succesor at the Physics chair at the Naval academy, took charge of the Meteorological station. In 1884. He published the book entitled Climate in Rijeka and Opatija (Das Klima von Fiume und Abbazia). The meteorological data in the book are presented in the very same way as it is done today, and therefore these data can be used for comparative purposes regarding climate variations/ changes.

Records about the need for a psychiatric hospital in Istria date back to the early 19th century). This article presents the views on the issue expressed by advisors of the National Council of Istria more than half a century later. It starts with the session held on 15 March 1864 and follows the development of views the National Council held, from the motion to build a new mental hospital in at the feet of Monte Ghiro to the actual construction of the "Santorio Santorio" Provincial Hospital (still existing) at the hill of St Mihovil in Pula. The paper also investigates the reasons why the Council advisors abandoned the project of building the psychiatric hospital in Istria in favour of a home for the mentally ill in Trieste, where many Istrian patients were provided accommodation from as early as the end of the eighteenth century until the end of World War II. During the rule of the Habsburg Monarchy, many other cities of the Empire hospitalised mental patients from Istria, whose pitiful condition was reported by Matteo Campitelli at the session of the Istrian Provincial Parliament in 1886.

This paper presents the most important historical facts about all forensic medicine workplaces in the Czech Republic since the beginning till present day, including a perspective on how to establish a new one. Each of the University Forensic Medicine Institutes or district Departments is covered by at least one author. The oldest institute is in Prague and in Brno, the youngest is in Pardubice.

The paper tackles the question of balneological treatment available for the members of the Order of Preachers in Central Europe between 1650 and 1720. I took advantage of a strict record keeping procedure within the Dominican order, which required that all members obtain a written permission from the Father Provincial before taking any journey beyond local boundaries. As all the records were kept in so called "Provincial books" (Libri provinciae) it was possible to identify travelling permits issued for balneological treatment and collect data about visits to spas from the entire Czech Province.

The reconciliation of 1867 between Austria and Hungary brought great changes to Hungarian public administration: the way towards the building up of a modern public administration had been opened. Although there was a functioning public health system and a related legislation from the late 18th century, major issues - such as balanced geographical distribution of medical personnel, fair access to medical services even in the poorer regions of the country, and the effective protection against some contagious diseases - were not resolved for decades. During the reform work of public administration since the 1870s, the lawmakers touched repeatedly the framework and functioning of the public health as well. Although the general conditions of the domain depended traditionally on the municipalities and counties due to the national importance of the matter, the government made efforts to make the functioning of the public health more efficient through centralisation. The contagious diseases continuously endangered the population, revealing the weak points in the existing public health system, thereby giving a momentum to the reforms and helping the government in its organization of prevention and clearly contributing to the legislation work.

In addition to health facilities and many other organizations, there was also a functioning weather station in the health and seaside resort of Abbazia/Opatija, known as the Nice of the Austrian riviera. Formal observation of weather in Abbazia/Opatija began in 1886 with the setting up of the weather station in Angiolina Park. During the period 1898-1915, the warden of this station and data collector was the local doctor, dr Franz Tripold. On the basis of the collected data, he wrote the first study of Abbazia/Opatija's climate and its effects on people. The study das Klima in Abbazia was published in 1906 in Abbazia als Kurort on the 60th birthday of Professor Julius Glax, head of the health resort in Abbazia/Opatija. The study highlighted the physiological effects of the maritime climate on people and examined the beneficial effects of the local climate on patients. The weather station in Opatija is still operating in Angiolina Park. Weather parameters to be gathered were determined by the First international Meteorological Congress in Vienna in 1873 and are still valid. The parameter of human well being÷bio meteorological prognosis has been added. Today, the collected data are sent to the National Meteorological and Hydrological service in Zagreb, from where they are returned to Opatija to be displayed on a screen in the town centre to help people to plan their daily activities and take appropriate measures to protect their health, which is especially important for patients.

Not only the health service but also several other humanitarian institutions and societies were active in Abbazia÷Opatija, the most important town on the once Austrian Riviera, the town that was also known as the Austrian Nice. The most important of the societies was The Health Resort Opatija Volunteer Fire Brigade and Rescue Society. The authors of this article have been particularly interested in the society's founding and its activity until it moved into the new building at 6, St. Florjan's Street in 1910. The fast urbanisation and the development of the industry raised the need of the well organised activity of putting out fires. The German gymnastics societies were the first to include the education and the skills development of the volunteer firemen into their programmes. The first volunteer fire brigades appeared in Austria after 1863. The huge fire that broke out in Vienna in 1881 showed that the fast and efficient rescuing demanded a well prepared organization of a team of rescuers. Based on the initiative of the chimney sweep Franz Drescher and The South Railway Company, the volunteer fire brigade was founded in Opatija already in 1886. The founding of the volunteer rescue society was based on the idea given by dr. Jaromir Mundy, the permanent guest in Opatija and a friend of prof. dr. Theodor Billroth, in 1894. The intertwining activity of the both societies resulted in their formal joining. The head physician became dr. Franz Tripold, the chief commander was Franz Doberlet junior. For his special merits, the general assembly of the Health Resort Opatija Volunteer Fire Brigade and Rescue Society appointed him the honourable commander of the society in 1903 and he received a special photo album with the photos of the volunteer firemen and the rescuers' practice. The Emperor Franz Joseph I Jubilee Fire Station, the Rescue Station And the Sanatorium (Kaiser Franz Joseph I Jubiläums - Feuerwehrrüstungshaus, Rettungsstation und Erholungsheim) was given to the use on 1st October 1910. Since then, the two societies worked at this same location. The Volunteer Fire Brigade Opatija has been located in this building ever since.