MOVEMENT OF PATIENTS IN THE STATE HOSPITALS DURING THE FIFTY-FOURTH AND FIFTY-FIFTH FISCAL YEARS. A study of the accompanying tables shows that on July 1, 1902, the beginning of the fifty-fourth fiscal year, there were 5,493 patients in the State Hospitals; and that during the year there were 1,299 patients admitted by commitment, and 72 escapes returned, making a total of 1,371 admissions, and a grand total of 6,864 under care and treatment. During the same period the discharges, deaths, and escapes amounted to 1,271, leaving 5,593 patients in the hospitals on June 30, 1903; an increase of 100 during the year. On July 1, 1903, the beginning of the fifty-fifth fiscal year, there were 5,593 patients. There were admitted during the year 1,283 patients by commitment, and 58 escapes returned, making a total of 1,341 received, and a grand total of 6,934 under care and treatment. During the fifty-fifth fiscal year the discharges, deaths, and escapes amounted to 1,183, leaving 5,717 patients in the hospitals on June 30, 1904; an increase of 124 during the year. Commenting on the figures given above, they make it evident that during the biennial period there was an increase of 224 patients over the number in the hospitals two years ago, or an average annual increase of 112 patients for the two years. There has been a material falling off in the average annual increase (119) of patients in the last six years, from 1898 to 1904, when compared with the six years from 1892 to 1898, during which period the average yearly increase was 190. In the last fourteen years the largest number of commitments in any one year was in the period from July 1, 1902, to June 30, 1903, when there were 1,299 admissions on commitments. The year ending June 30, 1904, was but little behind, with 1,283 commitments. From these figures it is clear that while the annual increase of those remaining in the hospitals at the end of the year is getting materially less, there is no corresponding decrease in the number of patients admitted. As a matter of fact, the number of admissions during the six years ending with June 30, 1904, is considerably larger than the admissions for the previous six years ending June 30, 1898, and the lessened annual increase is due to the larger total number of discharges and deaths in the last six years as compared with the previous like period, while the percentage of deaths and discharges to the whole number treated has made but slight increase. Under the law to prevent the overcrowding of hospitals for the insane (Lunacy Law, Section 2189, paragraph 5), we have returned a few patients to the counties, and at present have negotiations looking to the return of others. The law is weak, in that it does not clearly prescribe what disposition the Sheriff shall make of the patients returned. MOVEMENT OF PATIENTS DURING THE YEAR ENDING JUNE 30, 1903. Number admitted to June 30, 1903. 267 132 399 173 96 269 130 101 231 104 29 133 180 87 267 854 445 1,299 Men..... Agnews. Mendocino. MOVEMENT OF PATIENTS DURING THE YEAR ENDING JUNE 30, 1904. Southern Total. Number of patients June 30, 1903. 1,068 576 1,644 Number returned escapes 836 670 1,506 8 0 8 2 0 635 412 1,047 432 179 611 507 278 785 3,478 2,115 5,593 123 70 193 98 44 142 166 109 275 824 459 1,283 778 1,810 762 482 1,244 531 223 754 716 3871,103 4,360 2,574 6.934 REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. To the California State Commission in Lunacy: GENTLEMEN: I have the honor of presenting the following report for the fifty-fourth and fifty-fifth fiscal years. Your present Secretary has been in office since September 1, 1903. The collections for the maintenance of pay-patients at the five State Hospitals, and expense incurred in the commitment of patients, by this Commission, for the fifty-fourth fiscal year, ending June 30, 1903, were $12,901.77. The collections from the same sources by this Commission for the fifty-fifth fiscal year, ending June 30, 1904, were $25,293.39. The collections at the five State Hospitals, from those who are able to pay for their keeping, inclusive of the amount collected by this Commission, from the same source, for the fifty-fourth fiscal year amounted to $70,117.87; making a monthly average of $5,843.10. Similar collections for the fifty-fifth fiscal year amounted to $88,442.51; an average of $7,370.20 monthly. A number of inmates at the hospitals, who were on the "free-list," but whose relatives should have been paying for their keeping for many years past, have been settled for, and the patients are numbered among the pay-patients, thereby increasing materially the receipts at the State Hospitals. The proper accounting for the moneys collected by the authorities at the State Hospitals, as well as the patients' private funds, are matters that have taken considerable time and thought. It was discovered during the fore part of the present year, that there was money being collected at the Southern California State Hospital, for maintenance and the private accounts of the patients of that institution, which was not being properly accounted for. This state of affairs had existed for the seven years previous to its discovery. The exact amount of this defalcation will probably never be known; but enough information is at hand to show that it exceeds $11,000. Charles F. Waymire, your Assistant Secretary, assisted in working out the details of this shortage. A system of sending out, at stated intervals, a statement of the accounts of pay-patients at the hospitals, for verification, which has been adopted, will head off the opportunity for a defalcation of this character in the future. |