The military garrison hospital 3rd class at Sibolga (West Sumatra) was mentioned in the publication of D. Schoute “De Geneeskunde in Nederlandsch-Indie in de 19e eeuw”, GTNI 75 (1935) 10, 827. The article refers to a survey of  all the military facilities in 1867 . In that year the garrison  hospital of Sibolga had on average 28 patients. The hospital was part of the Military Medical Service (MGD),  which in 1867 (the year of the survey of all military facilities) managed a total of 79 facilities (3 large military hospitals, 35 garrison hospitals and 41 infirmaries) with on average 4,244 occupied beds.

Some 25 years later, the Annex D of the Koloniaal Verslag 1890 reports a total  of 3,358 inpatients by the end of that year, whereas 52,631 patients have been admitted for the whole of the Netherlands Indies. The report concerns 28 military hospitals, 54 ziekenzalen (infirmaries) and 6 specialized facilities. The garrison hospital has been downgraded to a military infirmary and its average occupation rate is then 4 patients, whereas 126 have been admitted that year. The situation by the end of the year 1890 is a presence of 4 patients.

About 1900 the situation of military health facilities was: 30 hospitals, 56 infirmaries and 5 specialized facilities, such as reconvalescent centers and leprosy asylums. The total number of admittances was in 1899: 57,071 and the number of present inpatients by the end of 1899: 3,731. These figures were for the infirmary at Sibolga: 68 admittances and no patients present on 31 December 1899 (See Koloniaal Verslag 1900, Addendum A).

Sibolga was in the 1930s the capital of the Residency Tapanuli with 12,000 inhabitants, among whom 241 Europeans and 1,900 Chinese. The town is situated on the Bay of Tapanuli and was well connected with the interior by motorways  (Gonggryp 1934, 1292). See also the Grote Atlas van Nederlands Oost Indie, page 109 with a townplan of Sibolga, dating Oktober 1945.