A post of advanced medical care operated close to where each battalion was stationed. It housed a small number of sick and wounded. At this post, the first health care to injured soldiers fallen in battle was administered.
Their facilities were no more sophisticated than a steel shelter with protection against gas attacks. The works were, as a rule, carried out by a physician and two nurses of the battalion.
The seriously injured were transferred to the hospitals at the rear, with transportation provided by the English authorities.
In addition to the Hospital of the Portuguese Red Cross and the Portuguese Section of the Red Triangle, Portugal had two base hospitals and one military hospital.
The War placed the Portuguese physicians in direct contact with new clinical cases, as a visible and direct consequence of the new weapons - explosive projectiles, rockets and machine guns – that had become common across the front.
Health Care
A ambulância - automóvel oferecida pela casa Burnay ao exército português. Ilustração Portugueza, série II, nº. 569, Lisboa, 15 de Janeiro de 1917, p. 48.
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