Hospitals, dispensaries and nursing : papers and discussions in the International congress of charities, correction and philanthropy, section III, Chicago, June 12th to 17th, 1893 / ed. by John S. Billings, M.D., Henry M. Hurd, M.D.

  • International Congress of Charities, Correction, and Philanthropy (1893 : Chicago).
Date:
1894
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Hospitals, dispensaries and nursing : papers and discussions in the International congress of charities, correction and philanthropy, section III, Chicago, June 12th to 17th, 1893 / ed. by John S. Billings, M.D., Henry M. Hurd, M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    was built up, after a separate struggle with the Board of Guardians in each Union. The underlying principle was adequate indoor relief. So gradual had the growth been that the medical profession were only just beginning to realize what had been done. If it had been less gradual, the ratepayers would have rebelled. That was a lesson of caution and patience in making further improvements. My friend Mr. Albert Pell, a great authority on matters relating to the poor and poor laws, gives this definition:—The qualification for admission to a hospital is disease; to a poor-law infirmary destitution—I should say destitution together with disease. The evidence of Miss Louisa Twining, given before the committee, is very interesting; this lady is vastly respected, having done for poor-law medical and other institutions, and following in her footsteps, very much that which Miss Nightingale has done for hospitals and nursing in general. Of the poor-law infirmaries, fourteen are on the pavilion system. Chronic cases are sent to the infirmaries from the general hospitals, and these institutions are full of chronic cases of great educational interest. Publicity and increased medical visitation would, in my opinion, be most desirable. The committee was told that the interests and reputations of eminent medical men will maintain the general hospitals with schools; otherwise—and it would be calamitous—there would be a danger of the poor-law infirmaries swallowing up the voluntary hospitals. The committee was plainly told that the feeling of degradation in regard to a taint of pauperism is dying out. One witness said further that he was told by a poor- law medical officer that he was in the habit of urging the poor to go into the infirmary, calling it the parish hospital; another medical man said he did not care how much a poor man's sensibility was rubbed off—from a medical point of view the thing is to cure. The evidence shows that the tendency within the infirmaries is to keep as much as possible out of sight and out of mind the ugly and repel- lent words poor law and pauper. The fever hospitals of the Metropolitan Asylums Board differ from the poor-law infirmaries, inasmuch as they take infectious dis- eases without regard to pauperism; these fever hospitals are working at high pressure, as will be seen by the following account, the last issued by the board. The chairman presented his annual report, which stated that during last year 13,093 scarlet-fever patients were received in the hospitals, an increase of 6556 over any previous year. During the year 46,074 cases of infectious disease were notified to the board, as