On Call in the Arctic

Imagine a young doctor, trained in the latest medical knowledge and state-of-the-art equipment, suddenly transported back to one of the world’s most isolated and unforgiving environments—Nome, Alaska.

That’s what happen to Dr. Sims. His plans to become a pediatric surgeon were drastically changed when, on the eve of being drafted into the Army to serve as a M.A.S.H. surgeon in Vietnam, he was offered a commission in the U.S. Public Health for assignment in Anchorage, Alaska, where he was scheduled to act as Chief of Pediatrics at the Alaska Native Medical Center.

But life changed, along with his military orders, when he learned he was being transferred from Anchorage to work as the only physician in Nome. There, he had the awesome responsibility of rendering medical care under archaic conditions to the population of this frontier town plus thirteen Eskimo villages in the surrounding Norton Sound area. And he did it alone with little help and support. All the while, he was pegged as both an “outsider” and an employee of the much-derided federal government.

In order to do his job, Dr. Sims had to overcome racism, cultural prejudices, and hostility from those who would have liked to see him sent packing. On Call in the Arctic reveals the thrills and the terrors of frontier medicine, showing how Dr. Sims had to rely upon his instincts, improvise, and persevere against all odds in order to help his patients on the icy shores of the Bering Sea.