El Hospital Salesiano “San José” de Viedma en los inicios del sistema sanitario rionegrino (fines de siglo XIX hasta la primera mitad del siglo XX)

Abstract

This article is a reconstruction about the incipient health system in the Territory of Río Negro from the end of the 19th century to the middle of the 20th century. The Salesian Congregations, Salesians and Hijas de María Auxiliadora, after their arrival in the Territory in 1880, began their missionary and educational work which included the "San José" hospital in Viedma (1889) and the one in San Carlos de Bariloche (1915). The "San José" Hospital was the first health care institution in Patagonia, supported by the Salesians. It received a small contribution from the central State and the Charitable Society and Charity organisations. The Salesian Congregation established social and political networks that gave rise to a collaborative but always autonomous relationship, which, far from confrontational, articulated with state agencies, despite the anticlerical conflict that gave rise to denunciations and sanctions. The "San José" Hospital had its own health agents (P. Evasio Garrone and Artémides Zatti), but the interventions and regulation of the National Department of Hygiene in the Hospital and the Pharmacy forced them to have "directors and technical staff" in the case of the doctors.