Report of Sub-Committee on Out-Patients.

  • Westminster Hospital. Sub-Committee on Out-Patients.
Date:
1873
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Report of Sub-Committee on Out-Patients. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    The enquiries determined upon were divided as follows:— 1st. The objects contemplated by the Founders of the Hospital, and recorded in Minutes made at the time. 2nd. The nature and extent of any existing abuses in the Out-Patient Department. 3rd. The practice of other Hospitals, as also of Dispen¬ saries, in adjoining districts. 4th. The practical measures best adapted to supply a remedy for any ascertained abuses, if possible in concert with other Hospitals in contiguous districts. While these enquiries were being prosecuted, a further Report from the Assistant Physicians, in accordance with a requisition of the House Committee of the 23rd of July, was referred to them (copy annexed, No. 1), shewing the working of the provisional measure of limiting the number of new cases to be seen daily in the Out-Patients’ rooms,—those having Governors’ letters and cases of urgency being excepted. In this latter report it is stated that one effect of the limitation has been to “increase the number of applicants who come provided with Governors’ letters.” They also state that “ the persons so selected are mostly suffering from chronic illness, or from the results of poor or intemperate living, and the proportion of serious cases is compar¬ atively small,” and further add that it is expected, “when the present system becomes more generally known among the pauper community, most of the applicants will be holders of these letters, and we shall thus revert to a system of relief through private recommendation which is now, as we believe, abandoned by all the general Hospitals in London.” With regard to Governors’ letters, they further observe, “it is obvious that unless some limitation is placed upon these, the present measures will be entirely nugatory. These recommendations, it is well known, are very easily obtained, and the making application for them forms a ready and convenient cover for common begging. As a matter of fact, these patients are not of the class for whom hospital relief is chiefly intended.” This Report concludes with words of serious import, to which your Committee would draw especial attention, “ considering that our Out-Patient department, unlike many other hospitals, is open every day in the week, we believe that in undertaking to give rational advice and directions to 15 new patients daily, the hospital fully meets all legitimate requirements, while we would submit that the labour and time required for this work is as much as we can conscientiously undertake, or can fairly be required at our hands.” With these data before them, the Sub-Committee have now to submit the result of the enquiries instituted under the heads above specified. 1. The objects contemplated by the Founders of the Hospital as recorded in Minutes made at the time.