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In Search of Lucille: The Woman Behind the Surgeon’s Mask
| Length: | 45 min |
| Released: | 2001 |
| Ages: |
High School College Adult |
This is an inspiring portrait of Dr. Lucille Teasdale, an extraordinary doctor and humanitarian who early in life focused on becoming a surgeon and ended up creating an important hospital in Uganda. The film uses a vivid combination of home movies, interviews, newsreel footage. and educational film to convey the times in which Dr. Teasdale lived.
When Dr. Teasdale began her medical studies, she was one of only 8 women admitted to a class 110 at the University of Montreal. After graduation and a grueling five-year internship as a surgeon, in 1955 she applied to 20 hospitals in the US; they all rejected her. When one of her colleagues, Dr. Piero Corti, opened a mission hospital in rural Uganda, he offered Dr. Teasdale a position which she accepted. They later married and had a daughter. For over 30 years Drs. Teasdale and Corti cared for thousands of Africans and enlarged their clinic into a 500 bed hospital, St. Mary’s-Lacor.
Dr. Teasdale handled everything from pediatrics to malaria as well as the surgical needs of thousands of people in the area. When the brutal dictator Idi Amin took power in Uganda in 1971, civil war broke out. The doctors became war physicians and their hospital a frontline facility. Then Uganda was invaded by a new invisible enemy—the AIDS virus—and Dr. Lucille became infected while operating on a patient. Despite her illness, she continued to save lives for another 15 years. She died in 1996 and was buried in Uganda among the people she loved and who revere her as a savior. Her wonderful legacy is the generation of doctors and nurses whom she and Dr. Corti trained. Today St. Mary’s-Lacor is one of the most up-to-date hospitals in Africa with teaching staff, shelters for refugees, and treatment for injuries and epidemics.
When Dr. Teasdale began her medical studies, she was one of only 8 women admitted to a class 110 at the University of Montreal. After graduation and a grueling five-year internship as a surgeon, in 1955 she applied to 20 hospitals in the US; they all rejected her. When one of her colleagues, Dr. Piero Corti, opened a mission hospital in rural Uganda, he offered Dr. Teasdale a position which she accepted. They later married and had a daughter. For over 30 years Drs. Teasdale and Corti cared for thousands of Africans and enlarged their clinic into a 500 bed hospital, St. Mary’s-Lacor.
Dr. Teasdale handled everything from pediatrics to malaria as well as the surgical needs of thousands of people in the area. When the brutal dictator Idi Amin took power in Uganda in 1971, civil war broke out. The doctors became war physicians and their hospital a frontline facility. Then Uganda was invaded by a new invisible enemy—the AIDS virus—and Dr. Lucille became infected while operating on a patient. Despite her illness, she continued to save lives for another 15 years. She died in 1996 and was buried in Uganda among the people she loved and who revere her as a savior. Her wonderful legacy is the generation of doctors and nurses whom she and Dr. Corti trained. Today St. Mary’s-Lacor is one of the most up-to-date hospitals in Africa with teaching staff, shelters for refugees, and treatment for injuries and epidemics.
"Recommended for Women's Studies and Asian Studies."
–Patricia B. McGee, Tennessee Technological University Educational Media Resources Online
–Patricia B. McGee, Tennessee Technological University Educational Media Resources Online
