해외여선교회(WFMS)의 서울지역 의료사업 - 동대문 부인병원을 중심으로 -

Abstract

This research aims to illuminate the establishment of Dongdaemun Women’s Hospital (East Gate Hospital) in Seoul. This facility was one of the achievements of the Woman’s Foreign Missionary Society’s (WFMS) medical missionary work, and it became the leading women’s medical institution in modern Korea. This article discusses important dates and roles of the WFMS and Dongdaemun Women’s Hospital using information from the annual reports of the Korea Woman’s Conference (KWC). Specially, to clarify the process involved in the hospital’s establishment and its historical meaning in the progress of women’s medicine, this research examines the official establishment dates and activities of Dongdaemun Women’s Hospital, Baldwin Dispensary, and Lillian Harris Memorial Hospital, and the relationships among the three medical institutions. The results show that the establishment of Lillian Harris Memorial Hospital did not immediately terminate the Baldwin Dispensary, the preexisting institution; hence, this research argues that the latter was not simply integrated into the former. Furthermore, in analyzing the hospital’s recognizable practices in obstetrics and gynecological diseases and contemporaries’ acknowledgment of these activities, this study offers an explanation for why the additional word “women” was included in the official Korean name of the hospital.