Review article
Health care for workers and disabled persons in Varaždin in the past
G. Piasek
; Djelatnost za zaštitu radnika Medicinskog centra, Varaždin
Abstract
Until the second half of 18th century there was no industry or manufacture in Varaždin so that physicians assumed no etiopathogenetic connection between harmful effects of work and working environment and human health. Only with the development of industry did some physicians start to think of such harmful effects and data on the activity of Varaždin physicians of that time show that some of them were enthusiastically concerned with the problem of the effect of work and working environment on human health. However, there was no organized activity such as the one performed today by occupational health. Some attempts are also known to have been made to provide medical care for disabled persons, that is, to make them capable of any work according to their residual working capacity. A figure of a blacksmith wearing glasses at work found on the cover of the box of the blacksmiths' guild dating from the second half of 17th century or the first half of 18th century is particularly interesting in this respect. Some medical historians think that these were protective glasses. Organized health care for the workers of Varaždin and its surrounding began with the institution of obligatory health insurance based on the law passed by the joint Hungarian and Croatian Diet in 1891. The practical application of this law dates from 28th January 1894 for the region of the former Varaždin Parish.
Keywords
Hrčak ID:
165006
URI
Publication date:
15.3.1978.
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