Imagini ale paginilor
PDF
ePub

Half-Yearly Summary

CALIFORNIA.-Southern California State Hospital, Patton.-The next quarterly meeting of the Lunacy Commission, representatives from the Boards of Managers, and the Medical Superintendents of the same, will be held at this institution on Saturday, April 21. The business to be transacted is as follows:

Psychic discordances, etc., by Dr. Leonard Stocking, Medical Superintendent of the State Hospital, Agnew, Cal., and Water in the Treatment of Acute Mental Diseases by Dr. E. E. Stone, Medical Superintendent of the State Hospital at Napa, Cal. The discussion upon the plans submitted for cottages for tubercular patients in the Southern California State Hospital at Patton, California. Discussion of cottages for receiving wards with complete hydrotherapeutic apparatus connected with the same.

The work on the east wing is rapidly nearing completion, and it will doubtless be ready for the accommodation of 150 patients by the first of August.

CONNECTICUT.-Connecticut Hospital for the Insane, Middletown.—The remodeling, enlargement, and decoration of the assembly room at this hospital is practically completed. The room will now have a seating capacity of about 1000.

The new hospital for contagious diseases is nearing completion. It is already closed in and the roof in place. The capacity when finished will be about fifty beds.

The Trustees contemplate increasing the water supply of the institution during the coming summer by building a new storage reservoir. The land for that purpose, which includes the site for the dam and an extensive water-shed, has already been acquired. No piping will be necessary.

The new bathing establishment consisting of twenty rain-baths, and including a complete hydrotherapeutic department, by Richter of New York, is nearly ready for use.

Contracts have been let for the erection of 1574 lineal feet of wrought iron fence about the grounds of the institution, and the work will be commenced at once.

Various other improvements are in contemplation for the coming summer. The number of patients under treatment at the expiration of the quarter ending with March 31, 1906, was 2481.

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.-Government Hospital for the Insane, Washington. The selection of Dr. Charles H. Clark to occupy the post of Clinical Director at this hospital, in effect April 1, this year, simultaneously creates

and fills a position in the hospital service which Dr. William A. White, the superintendent, has had under consideration since 1904. Dr. Clark has been a member of the medical staff of the Government Hospital since 1899 and has more recently filled the position of Second Assistant Physician. Closer organic connection of the different medical services, with general supervision of all medical work, of the hydrotherapeutic departments, the operating rooms and training school; the medium through which will be made all transfers of patients from one service to another, the making of special clinical studies and an effort to keep abreast of the medical literature of the times, with a view of having adopted any line of treatment that may be beneficial, indicate the scope of this officer's duties.

The appointment of a female assistant in the work being done in the laboratory having been determined upon, Miss Grace A. Lane has been promoted to this position from the ward service.

The work of the woman physician, Dr. Mary O'Malley, has fully justified her appointment, which took place in September last. Her presence has been felt in the daily inspections of the female section of the institution, as likewise in the treatment of the ills of the female employés and the female patients.

The hydrotherapeutic outfits, now three in number, are in daily operation, between sixty and seventy patients being treated each day.

A number of operations have been performed in the hospital operating room. Although not numerous they have been generally of such a character as to hardly have been justifiable except in a thoroughly equipped and modern operating room.

The piazzas on the second floor of Oaks A building have been enclosed in glass and a ward made having a southern exposure for white tubercular females.

Dix 3 building has been equipped for the use of colored tubercular males.

The Retreat building is in process of renovation, to be later occupied by colored men, who will vacate the Annex building.

The fire engine house has been fitted up and quarters have been opened upstairs for sleeping apartments for members of the engineering force, thus insuring some one on duty in this building throughout the night.

Contracts have been made for furnishing considerable quantities of fire hose and fire extinguishers for the hospital. Plans are being prepared for a somewhat elaborate installation of fire doors throughout the high buildings of the old construction.

In addition to these precautions a special engineer has been appointed who has complete charge of the fire apparatus and of the appurtenances pertaining to fire protection.

The installation of the new machinery with which the two additional wings built to the laundry have been equipped, has been completed.

A coal trestle is under construction adjoining the railroad track for use in handling hard coal. Incidentally it may be mentioned the hospital has

been receiving coal in order to be well supplied in any serious emergency that may arise, so that at this time about 6000 tons are on the grounds. An additional reservoir is being built at the pumping station.

Perhaps the greatest change wrought in the methods at this hospital in the past six months has been in conjunction with the installation of a more accurate business system through the various departments. This has been accomplished by the employment of an expert accountant, the working out of a very complete plan of auditing, cost accounting, etc., involving changes in store house methods, the issuance of goods, requisitions for supplies and the designation of a matron and chef to carefully inspect and note details in these regards.

ILLINOIS.-Illinois Asylum for the Incurable Insane, (Bartonville) Peoria.-Unusual activity marked every department of the institution during the biennial period just closed. The reorganization of the service incident to the passage of the civil service law and its application to the State charitable service wrought very few changes in this institution which, from the outset, was conducted on the merit system.

One of the gratifying results was the advancement of Dr. George Michell to the position of Senior Assistant Physician, a merited recognition of his faithful efforts in carrying out the fixed policy of the institution, nonrestraint and non-imprisonment.

More than two hundred patients have been admitted since January 1, bringing the total population up to sixteen hundred and fifty.

The increasing number of aged and infirm made it necessary to convert several of the smaller cottages into hospitals. In this manner hospital care was extended to one hundred additional sick or infirm inmates.

The epileptics have been segregated and will be given such dietetic and medicinal attention as may influence their condition. Careful records will be kept and results noted.

In December the entire force was put upon the eight-hour schedule. It is a move that has been in contemplation two years, and after four months' trial it is a pronounced success. It is not only a recognition of the just demands of labor but it has increased the efficiency of the force without materially adding to the cost of maintenance. A detailed statement of the classification of the inmates and the assignment of the force might be of interest, but would require too much space.

As fast as male attendants retired from the service women were substituted with the result that six hundred of the male inmates are now cared for by women. The improvement in the character and habits of the men has attracted favorable attention and the better care they are receiving has caused a decided improvement in their condition, especially in the infirmaries.

The experiment of caring for sixteen hundred and fifty inmates without bars, grating, cells or screened rooms and without mechanical restraint of any kind has proven an unqualified success. Not one escape occurred since the advent of the present year.

The fourth assistant physician will be a woman and will be named as soon as available applicants present themselves. She will be expected to aid materially in the organization and conduct of the projected training school.

The out-door treatment for consumptives continued through the winter with the exception of two stormy nights. One of the large porches is enclosed with heavy canvas and isolation is thorough. The immunity from tuberculosis is remarkable, six being the greatest number present at one time.

-Cook County Institutions, Dunning.-Definite plans have already been made for the installment of the hydrotherapeutic department appropriated for by the County Board. An equipment consisting of one controller table, one shower with overhead douche, side sprays and perineal douche, one massage table, one special bath tub, one sitz bath, one hot air cabinet, will be installed in the west end, ground floor, of the hospital building for insane, where it will be accessible not only to the patients from that department, but by the special entrance to patients from any other department of the Cook County Institutions. Aside from the above equipment there will be a special department consisting of four continuous baths installed in a room adjoining the hydrotherapeutic department proper and another room also with four continuous baths on the opposite side of the building devoted to women patients. In addition, one of these special equipments for continuous baths will be installed in the receiving ward for men patients and another in the receiving ward for women patients. It is the intention to take care of the acutely maniacal and other suitable patients in the hospital building, using continuous baths as much as possible. The two equipments for the receiving wards are for the treatment of rather temporary excitements or other conditions requiring it.

An X-Ray outfit consisting of an 18-inch coil, several Crook's tubes and a high-frequency therapeutic outfit has already been installed and is being used at present.

A systematized effort is made towards providing almost constant occupation for the greatest number of the insane, particularly for the chronic class. A serious effort is being made not only to occupy the patients but to educate as many of them as possible in some industrial occupation, the object being to make them more or less permanently useful and probably capable of being useful outside of an institution of this kind, if suitable supervision can be provided for them. Large classes of women have been organized to begin with knitting and with rough sewing. From these classes individual workers capable of better work are selected and banded together into higher classes with a higher grade of work. The men patients are occupied mostly in common labor and in the truck garden. Smaller classes are organized for the purpose of industrial education and work along various lines, particularly necessary repairs and work in the tailor-shop, shoe-shop, carpenter-shop and elsewhere.

A suitable large hall equipped as a smoking-room has been provided for men employés. Heretofore there has been absolutely no provision made for the entertainment of employés. A combination billiard and pool table has already been purchased and it is the intention to construct a bowling-alley. Suitable accommodation has also been provided for the entertainment of women employés.

-Illinois Eastern Hospital for the Insane, Hospital.-Special attention has been paid during the past six months to the training school for nurses. The medical staff has been increased to nine members, and as each physician has to lecture to both juniors and seniors the course has been proportionately strengthened. The standard of the entrance examination to the senior class has been raised, this combined with the fact that there have been more autopsies leads to the hope that this class will excel all former classes. The graduating exercises will take place about the tenth of May.

Owing to the epidemic of smallpox in one of the other of the state institutions, and to the fact that many patients come from the congested districts of Chicago, extra precautions have been taken against contagious diseases. Whenever a patient is admitted his or her clothing is removed and placed in isolated basement rooms. These rooms have but one door and one window which can be tightly sealed. The disinfection apparatus as advised by the Illinois State Board of Health consists of a generator made here in the tin shop, being practically a tin can with flaring top covered with asbestos paper. It resembles a 15 by 10-inch inverted cone. In the container is placed 31⁄2 ounces of potassium permanganate, over which is poured one pint of formaline 40% aqueous solution.

The weekly expense of subjecting the accumulated clothing to the generating gas is moderate, and the results entirely satisfactory. The patients are given disinfectant baths and supplied with state clothing before they are allowed to enter the receiving wards.

Entertainments for the patients have been more diversified during the past winter. In addition to the two weekly dances there has been organized two indoor baseball teams and six basket ball teams consisting of two male and two female attendants' teams, besides two teams composed of female patients. The patients, those that watched and those that played, took great delight in these games, which were held in the amusement hall, the attendants playing fifteen-minute and the patients ten-minute halves.

A class in calisthenics has been organized, as an experiment, in two of the male wards; these patients being drilled for twenty minutes daily. This attempt has proved so beneficial and interesting to many that it is expected to enlarge the class and to hold the exercises in the general amusement hall, where all the patients who attend the amusements may see or take part in the drill.

-Illinois Central Hospital for the Insane, Jacksonville.-The training school started over a year ago is proving a success.

« ÎnapoiContinuă »