From Treatment to Vacation 179the required intervals and did not get sunburned.^29 Vacationers confi rmed
their gratitude for the “help, attention, advice, and motherly regard” from the
medical staff in sanatorium comment books. Doctors drew praise, often by
name, for their “humanism” and willingness to help their patients. Gratitude
for the medical staff’s “considerate approach” ( chutkoe otnoshenie ) appeared
in nearly every comment. The vacationers’ improved health, acknowledged
in these comments, could have occurred only through the care and attention
of the doctors and nurses.^30
Vacation: Add Fun and Stir
Alongside this medical regime, growing attention to pleasure and recre-
ation found expression in the kurort experience. Occasionally authorities
would question the wisdom and effi cacy of the lavish expenditures on medi-
cal infrastructure. The Twentieth Party Congress in 1956 licensed a review
of practices in many parts of Soviet society, and the kurort regime was no
exception. Perhaps it was time to change the standardized terms of treat-
ment, which had not been reviewed in fi fteen years, suggested one doctor.
The transfer of kurort affairs from the health ministry to the trade unions in
1960 might have provided an opportunity to rethink the emphasis on medi-
cine, but the transfer produced no change. When a Hungarian health offi cial
questioned the heavy staffi ng requirements of the Soviet kurort regime at an
international conference in 1961, Soviet offi cials defended their practices. It
would be unthinkable to alter the Sochi staff ratio of 250 personnel for 350
vacationers: “Our task is to relieve our patients from all manner of concerns,”
and “We don’t have the right to reduce the care we give to our laboring peo-
ple.” In 1976, as the Kurort Administration looked ahead to a new fi ve-year
plan, the central trade union secretary, Shalaev, confi rmed the preeminence
of medicine but suggested that it was time to rethink the balance: we have
devoted too much attention to medical sanatoria in the last fi ve years, he
argued; we cannot continue to rely on forms of vacation that were developed
in 1925. Working people of today have new needs and new demands.^31
- GARF, f. 9493, op. 8, d. 326, ll. 210–211, 14; Trud , 19 June 1973; GARF, f. 9493, op. 8,
d. 238, l. 180; GAGS, f. R-178, op. 1, d. 36 (Raduga sanatorium medical report, 1954), l. 25; f.
214, op. 1, d. 72 (coal industry ministry sanatorium medical report, 1953), l. 37. - I sampled comment books from the Raduga (Rainbow) sanatorium in Sochi. Com-
ments were often written on behalf of groups rather than by individuals, and they are re-
markable for the sameness of the words and sentiments. We should not, however, dismiss
the sincerity of the emotions they represent just because they appear to fi t a particular tem-
plate of gratitude. GAGS, f. 178, op. 1, d. 95 (1962) and d. 53 (1958). Dentists in particular
drew more criticism than other types of medical staff. After the medical staff, waitresses
received the most grateful mentions. - TsGAMO, f. 7223, op. 1, d. 1252, l. 16; GARF, f. 9493, op. 8, d. 238, ll. 141–42, 178–
180; d. 2303, ll. 202, 207.