[Radium therapy in a county hospital on the island of Mors, Denmark].

Abstract

In Denmark it was decided early in the 20th century that therapy with radium should be restricted to major centres in the three largest cities, Copenhagen, Aarhus and Odense. In the northern part of Jutland the chief surgeon of Nykøbing Mors Hospital, Jacob Nordentoft (1881-1954), had studied radium treatment in Hamburg with Albers-Schönberg and in Paris with Marie Curie, and he had used radium in his private clinic since 1910. Naturally he wanted to continue this when he became chief in Nykøbing in 1922. As he was denied this the 22,000 inhabitants of this small island in 1931 collected 28,790 Danish Crowns for him as a birthday present and afterwards he could buy 94 mg pure radium from Belgium. With this amount he established a Radium Centre which lasted for 30 years.