The report of the Committee of Visitors and of the medical superintendent of the West Riding Pauper Lunatic Asylum, for the year 1867.

  • West Riding Pauper Lunatic Asylum.
Date:
1868
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The report of the Committee of Visitors and of the medical superintendent of the West Riding Pauper Lunatic Asylum, for the year 1867. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by UCL Library Services. The original may be consulted at UCL (University College London)

    14/48 (page 12)
    No Classes for the instruction of the Patients in reading and writing have yet been organized, and we beg to direct attention to this subject, which we think important. The Wards were throughout well ventilated and in excellent order, and very great improvements have been carried out in many of them. The walls of the corridors and day-rooms have been papered and painted in cheerful colours, and considerable additions have been made to the number of pictures and statuettes. Wooden floors have been substituted for flags in No. 2 and 18 wards, and generally a consider- able quantity of new furniture has been supplied. The Hospital has been finished, and very completely furnished for 22 inmates, and it is, we think, admirably adapted for its purpose. At present it contains no Patients. The new Ward for Men has also been completed, and is now occupied by 100 Patients. The accommodation here is of the very best descrip- tion, and all the fittings and arrangements are most complete and convenient. There is room for 120 Patients. The cost of this building including furniture and fittings has been £64 3s. per head, and the Hospital has been provided for £126 per head. We have made the usual statutory enquiries as regards the Attendants : we find there are now 45 Attendants, and 3 Female Nurses for the Men, and 36 Nurses for the Women, besides 2 night attendants iu the Male, and 3 for the Female Division. These numbers do not include artizans and tradesmen who have charge of the Patients working at their respective trades, and of whom there are nine. There are now vacancies for 41 Male, and 4 Female Patients, but the latter will be immediately filled by Women, for whom admission has been sought. A very considerable number of Women Patients have of necessity been refused admission during the past year, and with a view of diminishing in some degree this pressure for accommodation, we have suggested to Dr. Beowne that he should take steps to discharge upon trial to their friends, under the provisions of the 79th section of the Lunatic Asylums Act, 1853, such harmless and chronic cases as