Organization of care for Soviet soldiers wounded in the maxillofacial region during World War II

The article shows the role of the Main Military Medical Directorate of the Red Army headed by E.I. Smirnov, the Chief Surgeon N.N. Burdenko and his deputies in the treatment and evacuation of troops and the organization of specialized care for the wounded in the maxillofacial region (MFR) during the Second World War. Facial wounds were diagnosed in about 4% of the servicemen who received gunshot wounds, with injuries to the bones of the facial skeleton occurring 1.5 times more often than isolated soft tissue wounds. Each MFR wound had its own peculiarities formed by several factors, the combination of which determined the clinical course, complications and outcome of mine-explosive, through and blind, bullet and shrapnel wounds of the head and neck. Gunshot injuries of facial bones were accompanied by simultaneous damage to the adjacent and distant body regions in 32.5%; almost half of such wounds were multiple. In patients with multiple wounds, the face and neck (17.3%), upper extremities (8.6%), lower extremities (4.6%), followed by the chest (3.3%) were most often injured. Among those wounded in the face and jaws, 13.6% had simultaneous wounds to the eyelids and eyes (4.6%), nose (3.7%), forehead (3.4%), and ear (1.9%). During the whole period of the war, the total number of fully recovered wounded with injuries of the face and jaws amounted to 85.1%. For isolated facial soft tissue injuries, this number reached 95.5%. Such a large number of experienced and trained soldiers and officers returned to service had not been seen in any of the armies of the nations involved in World War II.
Keywords: history of military medicine, World War II, maxillofacial surgery, medical care of the wounded, facial wounds, jaw wounds
Conflicts of interest. The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare.
Funding. There was no funding for this study