The position of the general medical practitioners in a reorganised system of public health
1919 1919 1910s 18 pages the country, and the demand for hospital treatment by many of those now accustomed to obtain treatment in their homes who will in future be unable to do so owing to lack of service and accommodation which are required when private nurses are employed in a sick person...
| Institution: | MCR - The Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick |
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| Language: | English English |
| Published: |
London : Co-operative Printing Society
[1919?]
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/10796/C3EE5B5F-1247-4528-B83C-D788F9180FFC http://hdl.handle.net/10796/47C7C43E-1733-4F78-B4A9-54F3223C914D |
| Summary: | 1919
1919
1910s
18 pages
the country, and the demand for hospital treatment by many of those now accustomed to obtain treatment in their homes who will in future be unable to do so owing to lack of service and accommodation which are required when private nurses are employed in a sick person's house. To keep this demand within reasonable bounds it will be necessary to increase existing facilities for domiciliary treatment, both by general practitioners and specialists, so as to avoid the extravagance of utilising hospital beds for the purpose of obtaining treatment not otherwise obtainable under existing conditions, although so far as the nature of the case is concerned it could equally well be given in the patient's own home, the additional accommodation must be secured partly by extension or transformation of existing institutions, and partly by the establishment of new institutions. While from the point of view of the individual sick person all hospital treatment must be regarded as having as its sole object the speedy and effective cure of his disease or injury, from the point of view of the community generally the hospital has various functions. Roughly these are: (i.) To secure an increase of knowledge of disease and its treatment so that advances in methods of prevention and cure may be constantly made; (ii.) to secure the education of the future practitioners of medicine so that they may be skilled in the prevention, the diagnosis, and the treatment of disease; (iii.) to secure the progressive experience of all specialists and medical practitioners, either upon the staff or working in the neighbourhood, so that they may maintain and increase their power of serving their patient. To secure these aims for the community without detriment to the interests of the individual patient, it will be necessary to maintain a distinction between different types of hospitals: — (i.) The hospitals to which medical schools are attached, usually to be found in university cities. (ii.) The hospitals in capital towns of smaller size, of sufficient importance to attract to their staffs men practising as specialists. (iii.) The hospitals in smaller towns and villages (usually called cottage hospitals) staffed by local general practitioners. Group (i.).— In view of the great importance of the educational and research work of the hospitals with medical schools, and of the present connection of many of them with the Board of Education, it is desirable that their educational work should at least remain primarily under the Board acting through the local university. In so far as the local Health Authority provides any subsidy to secure adequate accommodation in such hospitals for the public for whose treatment it is responsible, it would be necessary for it also to obtain some measure of control. This public control could best be arranged both for the university and the local authority by means of the right of inspection and the right of nominating of representatives upon the Governing Board. Groups (ii.) and (iii.).— Those hospitals should either be under the joint control of the local authority and of the existing Governing Board, or under the sole control of the local authority. In many districts it will be necessary to found new institutions which would probably be under the sole control of the authority. As opportunity arises the local authority would transform Poor Law infirmaries into hospitals either of type (ii.) or (iii.). The local authority will secure to all medical men practising in the area under adequate safeguards the right to admit suitable cases into the beds of these hospitals, and will secure to such medical men as desire it, the right to retain the treatment of their own patients when so admitted. The right should also be secured for medical men practising in the area served by the hospital to elect representatives to the Medical Committee entrusted with the professional administration 12
36/H24/6 |
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| Physical Description: | TEXT |