Report on the state of the lying-in hospitals, in Europe : to the managers of the Preston Retreat, and to the Obstetrical Committee of the College of Physicians / by James Bryan.

  • Bryan, James, 1810-1881.
Date:
1845
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Report on the state of the lying-in hospitals, in Europe : to the managers of the Preston Retreat, and to the Obstetrical Committee of the College of Physicians / by James Bryan. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    With regard to the government and management of them, there is, where the hospital is large, a resident physician and an assistant physician, who attend not only to the lying-in women, but to the children in the department for foundlings. They deliver lectures at stated times to female pupils, who attend in large numbers. In ad- dition to these, there is a matron, who, under the physician, sees to the execution of his commands, superintends all the drudgery of the house, sees to the good behaviour of the pupils, &c. &c. The whole is under the inspection of the police, and controlled bv the government. To the former, the secretary of the hospital makes out a daily statement of the number of cases on hand—number admitted, sick, &c. The department for foundlings is one which requires much care and expense. The number of children exposed and left, in Italy, by their parents, is immense. The plan adopted with regard to them, is much the same as that of the large foundling hospital of Paris. Many of the children are sent to the country to be taken care of by strangers, who receive a small annual stipend for the fir6t six years, after which they receive two suits of clothes per annum, until the child attains its fourteenth year, when its foster parents re- ceive nothing more. In Rome, a system of education in the hospital has been adopted for the females, embracing instruction in several of the domestic arts. These on marriage receive a dowry of about 200 scudi; their character, however, I was informed was such as to make it difficult to find husbands for them, even with the dowry. The following quotations from my note book will afford some idea of other particulars : October, 1838. Venice.—Obtained a note to the physician of the Civil Hospital. The wards are very large; the greater part of the house is an old convent; many of the rooms contain forty-one beds. The three or four appropriated to lying-in women, have nothing of special interest; they differ from the rest in being smaller and containing but two or three beds ; brick floors ; and arranged like the cells of a mad-house. The number of cases per annum, does not exceed a hundred. 2*