On the mortality of London hospitals : and incidentally on the deaths in the prisons and public institutions of the metropolis / by William A. Guy.

  • Guy, William A. (William Augustus), 1810-1885.
Date:
[1867]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the mortality of London hospitals : and incidentally on the deaths in the prisons and public institutions of the metropolis / by William A. Guy. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    therefore, being more than twice as numerous as the females. The death-rate, without distinction of sex, was, for the Royal Free 71 per 1,000, for the London Hospital 94 per 1,000. But, if we suppose each hospital to have admitted 500 males and 500 females, the death- rate becomes, for the Royal Free 70, for the London 91. This correction, therefore, makes a dilference of 3 per i ,000. The interval is narrowed from 94—71 to 91—70. I will take one more case of this class. St. George’s Hospital, in the four years 1862-65, admitted 8,975 male, and 6,277 female, patients, being about 3 to 2 ; while the proportion for the London Hospital, for three years, was more than 2 to i. The aggregate mortality for the London Hospital was 94, for St. George’s 88 ; but for an equal population of 500 males and 500 females, the death- rate at London Hospital becomes 91, and at St. George’s 86. Both figures are reduced, but the divergence which was represented by the figure 6 is now represented by the figure 5 (94—88 and 91—86). A third cause which affects the death-rate of our general hospitals, by modifying the severity of the cases admitted, is the existence or non-existence of special wards, or the existence of special wards for patients more or less strongly contrasted and subject to different rates of mortality. Under this head I will compare the two great hospitals, St. Bartholomew’s and Guy’s, and for the four years 1861, 1863, 1864, and 1866. In the four years in question, the gross death-rate for Bartholomew’s Hospital was 106, for Guy’s 95 ; but after deducting the patients and deaths in their respective special wards, the figures become 121 and 115 ; a divergence in the one case of 11 per i ,000, in the other of only 6 per 1,000. I have now illustrated by suitable examples the influence of the distribution of medical and surgical cases, of special wards, and of the varying proportion of males and females, on the gross mortality of our general hospitals ; and I will conclude this part of my sub- ject by a single illustration of the relative force of these three modifying agents. I take for this purpose the death-rates of St. Bartholomew’s and Guy’s Hospitals for the fatal year 1864. In that year 5,543 patients admitted into St. Bartholomew’s sustained a mortality of 617, and 4,989 admitted into Guy’s Hospital a loss of 480. The death-rate in the one was 111 per 1,000, in the other 96 per 1,000. But while there were admitted into the special wards of St. Bartholomew’s 848 patients, of whom 17 died, there were admitted into the special wards of Guy’s 1,026, of whom only 12 died. If now we deduct these admissions into special wards with the corresponding deaths, we have for the general wards