The report of the ordinary and resident medical officers, and the Inspector and Director of the Public Hospital, Kingston, Jamaica, for the year 1865.

  • Kingston Public Hospital (Jamaica)
Date:
1866
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The report of the ordinary and resident medical officers, and the Inspector and Director of the Public Hospital, Kingston, Jamaica, for the year 1865. 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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    we would rd’ev to a leiigthenctl coiTospoiulciice we have held with tlie lata and pre.sent Inspector and Director. We are glad to state that many of our suggestions and recommendations have been carried out ])v the Government. Tiicre is one particular form of disease which we consider it our dutjr especially to refer, as by far the greater proportion of the Hos- pital admission? are for this disease. Ulcers, principally of the lower extremities, daring the last linaiicial year, wen^ the cause of admis- sion of23.2G per cent, of all admitted into the Hospital. This year the unmber of tlio.se cases slightly increased, as 24-1] per cent, were admitted. Tliis disease in tlie Kingston Hospital seems enormons- jy out of proportion to the others, when compared with British Hos- pitals. In a table we have beside ns, of the diseases of one hundred and eighty-eight thousand six hundred and thirty patients treated in the Hospitals, Infirmaries. &e. of England and Wales during the year 1SG3, we find that only two thousand six liiindred and se- venty-seven, or less than one and a-half per cent, were adiiiitted for uleers. The niimhcr of nicer cases admitted into the Kingston Hos- pital has been gradually rncreasiiig year ]»y year. In 18G2-3, it was 21.47 percent. In 18G3-4, it was 23.26 per'cent. In 1834-5, it was 24.11 per cent. In this, as in previous years, the Medical OtEcers have, out of the nnmerous persons with ulcers who applied for ad- mission, rejected the slighter cases, and onlv admitted the more se- vere and dangerous. But still, t!io above figures shew the largo amount that/iarZ to be admitted. We fully agree with tlie remarks of the late Inspector and Director in his last annual report, when he says, “ many of tliis class of patients are generally iu fair bodily health ; they are always the longest resident w ithin the wards ; are the most troublesome, and coutrilmtc not only to swell np the die- tary expenses of the establishment, hut occupy beds which might be . otherwise available for the more legitimate objects of an Hospital.” It may, then, well be asked, why should this class of patients he ad- mitted in such large numbers ? Wo can only state, the Medical Of- . fjcers of this Hospital are in a measure co7npdlcd to admit tlicm. Many are half-starved, in the last slage of exhaustion, with enor- mous sloughing or pliagadeuic ulcers, often opening into the large joints of the leg, About the propriety of admitting these, no doubt can exist, as prompt Medical and Surgical treatment, together with the highest feeding, arid the liberal use of stiinuhints is urgently call- ed for in order to save or prolong life.. But wo cannot shut oiir eyes to the fact, that the greater proportion of the iilcor patients admitted, if placed on a good plain diet, assimilated to that they generally make use of in health, rest and strict cleanliness enforced, would lie equally well treated under occasional medical superintendence iu an Alms-House, at a very much cheaper rate. But still, in the absence , of proper Poor Law regulations, and Alms-House accommodation ; throughout the island, the Kingston Hospital is the refuge to which - destitute and starving nicer patients resort from all parts of the is- land, and the Medical Officers are compelled to admit them, either ' because they are found to he suffering from such an amount of des- v;' titution and debility as to place their lives in danger, or because their