• The Journal of Korean Medical History
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.67-98
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• 2009

This paper initiates an effort to look at "South Korean" medicine as perhaps distinct from "Korean" medicine, focusing specifically on the possibility of offering a post-colonial history of medicine. As such, the paper looks at the formation of the NMC (National Medical Center) in Seoul in 1958 (1958-1963, 1963-1968, 1968-1971) by a consortium of European actors--Denmark, Sweden, and Norway--invested in developing new forms of international assistance after the Korean War. Rather than take a firm stance, the paper ultimately suggests that the role of these actors in formative South Korean institutions was constitutive, and perhaps requires much more examination in the future.