The history of the ambulance and how its evolved

Like most things even the ambulance has had its roots embedded in the ancient times when carts were used to ferry patients along to the medicine man. We cannot think of the ambulance as anything but a modern emergency vehicle which is well equipped enough to save patient’s life.

However, the earliest of a record about transporting a patient by a hammock cart is in the Anglo Saxon era around 900 A.D. This means was strictly for patients afflicted with leprosy or the ones requiring psychiatric treatments. Even Muslim history has the record of mobile dispensaries in the time of Prophet Mohammed around the 7^th century. These mobile dispensaries were used by soldiers in the army during the Muslim conquests.

Further the record of using ambulances near battlefields to treat wounded soldiers is found in the history of Spain. In the year 1487, ambulancias, the earliest of the ambulances was used to for the Spanish army which was usually treated well. The first major breakthrough in the history of ambulances came when the physician of Napolean Bonaparte, Dominique Jean Larrey designed ambulances out of two to four wheeler horse wagons that could pick up wounded soldiers from the battlefield and transport them to a safer place where they were treated.

In 1832 , during the time pf cholera in London transport carriages were first introduced. Later Jonathan Letterman and Joseph Barnes reworked the whole concept of ambulances and gave them the modern day look and design. Their original inspiration had been Larrey’s design.