Memorial General Hospital (MGH) rises above the city of Las Cruces, New Mexico, like a huge ship plowing the desert sea. Located on a slope descending just west of the Organ Mountains the valley below, MGH is a testament to the population's efforts to themselves and their fellow citizens with the best in modern medical care. From an eight-four-bed hospital on Alameda Street in 1950, to the 160-bed facility established in 1971, services continue to grow. One hundred and three beds were added in 1981, magnetic catheterization lab.
The city and surrounding area are served by 125 physicians, from family practitioners to neurosurgeons, many of whom have been attracted to the area by its growth, mild climate, and slower pace of life. Still, MGH and the physician population are only one part of the health care delivery system in the area known as the Mesilla Valley. There is a much older, more traditional system in the valley that exists beside and within the new. It is not so visible or perhaps as impressive, but it is a part of cultural fabric of the valley itself.
The existence of this second system is evident at the local farmers' market on the Las Cruces downtown mall on any Wednesday or Saturday morning. The herb lady, Mrs. Ochoa, can always be found at her stall, behind an array of carefully labeled packets of manzanilla, gordo lobo, alhucema, poleo, and chamiso. Mrs. Ochoa, a registered nurse whose mother and grandmother were herbalists, expertly recommends remedies for the minor ailments her customers describe. And customers are plentiful for the services and remedies of the folk medical system in the valley.
The valley and its people
The Mesilla Valley is located primarily in southern Dona Ana county of southern New Mexico. It consists of a strip of agricultural land, approximately forty to fifty miles long and three to ten miles wide, depending upon whether one includes the drier slopes on either side. The valley encompasses the city of Las Cruces, the state's second largest city, the old territorial capital of La Mesilla, and several small villages. The area is a major producer of lettuce, onions, cotton, and chili peppers, as well as pecans and other crops.
However, it is the people, cultural heritage, and alternative folk medical traditions that give the valley its uniqueness. Although the city of Las Cruces is growing (population 57,000), and along with surrounding villages has been designated as a Standard Metropolitical Statistical Area, the character of the Mesilla Valley is still distinctly rural and agrarian. It originally attracted large, extended families with a strong religious orientation, and it has maintained a rural and isolated life-style.
Both before and after statehood in 1912, southern New Mexico (only forty-five miles from the Mexican border) has always been more heavily influenced by Mexico than has northern New Mexico, which was colonized by the Spanish. New Mexico, Americans of Mexican origin were a case apart, rising to better economic, social, and cultural positions than Mexican-Americans in other states. They were more likely to maintain cultural traditions, including those of folk medicine, and were less subject to Americanization.
In the 1930s, sociologist Sigurd Johansen
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