WWI X-Rays

• 1. rays


  Rays that can go through flesh but not bone or metal
• Wilhelm Röntgen discovered X-rays


  1895
• Wilhelm Röntgen: 'All bodies are transparent to this agent for privacy's sake I will use the Expression raise and distinguish them from others of its name I shall call them x-rays'
• Uses of X-rays


  • Diagnose broken bones
  • Find objects like bullets and shrapnel lodged in flesh and bone
• Mobile X-ray machine


  • Photograph of a mobile X-ray machine set up for demonstration in 1917
• Mobile X-ray machine


  • Main equipment laid out for demonstration
  • Tent where patient could be laid out and X-ray image taken
  • Equipment powered by onboard generator
  • Quality lower than static X-ray machines but adequate for finding bullets and shrapnel
• 1. ray technology was far from perfected at this time

  2. rays only detected hard objects like bullets and shrapnel but not items like wood splinters and bits of dirty cloth that might cause infection
• 1. ray images took several minutes to take

  Difficult if a man was writhing in agony
• 1. ray tubes heated up


  Needed to be left for an hour to cool down after taking
• From 1917 the USA entered the war and brought improved X-ray tubes from France developed by William Coolidge
• 1. ray machines provided a way of finding shrapnel and bullets inside the body without harmful and invasive exploratory surgery
• 1. rays could be used to diagnose broken bones but for the most part the circumstances and Technology of World War One meant that X-ray photography lacked the sufficient quality to do this
• By the end of World War One Mobile X-Ray machines and static ones at casualty clearing stations and base hospitals were proving their worth and helping men get the treatment they needed without devastating exploratory surgery