A letter to Lord Aberdare, chairman of the Managing Committee of the Hospital for Sick Children / by Charles West.

  • West, Charles, 1816-1898.
Date:
1887
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A letter to Lord Aberdare, chairman of the Managing Committee of the Hospital for Sick Children / by Charles West. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    caae of that as of other contagious diseases, subject to the same regulation as already referred to with reference to children under two. If they do not suffice, an additional small isolation ward may be needed. Between that, however, and the opening a special ward for the general reception ot Hoopin^ Cough, there is immense difference, and it is to this latter proposal that I venture to demur. I do so because, while in its milder forms it is of little import, in its severer it is most perilous ; and for such severer cases, as well as for Hooping Cough occurring in the wards of the hospital, a small room with three or four beds would suffice. Even in the large Prince Paul Hospital at St. Petersburg, two small rooms, with two beds in the one and four in the other, are regarded as sufficient, though the annual admissions of patients vary from 1600 to 2000. Moreover, 41-2 per cent, of all cases of Hooping Cough, according to the statistics of 1367 cases which I collected, or 48 per cent, according to Dr. Unruh of Dresden out of 1952, occur under two years of age; and further, 4P2 per cent, of all deaths under the age of 12 from Hooping Cough occur tinder the age of two. Dr. Unruh, out of a total of 134 deaths under 12 from Hooping Cough, found 67, or 5P5 per cent., under two; while Dr. Rauchfuss of St. Petersburg writes to me: Age has the greatest influence on mortality. The greatest is under two, after four it lessens rapidly. The objections, then, already stated to the general reception of children under two apply here with double force- Tables V. and VI. illustrate the practice of different hospitals with reference to the reception of Diphtheria, for which the Report, adopting the views of the Medical Staff, insists on the establishment of a Special Ward. It is not to be wondered at if small hospitals with limited space and small funds, avoid the reception of contagious cases which they are unable to isolate. The hospital at Glasgow, which receives Diphtheria only exceptionally, the Bast London Hospital and that at Bristol, are the only hospitals oE any size admitting Diphtheria, which do not make special provision for its recep- tion. The practice at Bristol can scarcely bo appealed to in evidence, since that hospital also roccives adult women.