The labour movement and the hospital crisis
1922 1922 1920s 21 pages be searched and careful microscopic or chemical examinations of the secretions, blood, or portions of tissue, may be carried out. A General Hospital to-day is indeed an excellent example of the necessity for "team-work" and of the benefits that may be deriv...
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| Institution: | MCR - The Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick |
| Language: | English English |
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London ; published by the Trades Union Congress and the Labour Party
[1922]
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| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/10796/31223B2C-F65A-48E6-B7FB-68A2E8D1492F http://hdl.handle.net/10796/352401DE-C62A-4B87-918B-6A427B4BCB7E |
| Summary: | 1922
1922
1920s
21 pages
be searched and careful microscopic or chemical examinations of the secretions, blood, or portions of tissue, may be carried out. A General Hospital to-day is indeed an excellent example of the necessity for "team-work" and of the benefits that may be derived therefrom, and the policy of the Labour Movement is to secure similar benefits for all, both within, and, as far as possible, without the walls of the Hospitals. NECESSITY OF HOSPITALS TO A HEALTHY NATION In general practice in the poorer districts of the towns and in country districts it is extremely difficult to secure all that may be advisable, or even all that is necessary, for accurate diagnosis and efficient treatment, and sufferers have to be content with something less than the best. Amongst the richer classes diagnosis alone often involves a round of visits to several specialists, entailing great expense, fatigue and worry, whilst treatment may necessitate entrance to a private nursing home, with frequent visits from the various specialists; the whole process is clumsy and involves much loss of time and unnecessary work to the specialists. While admitting that efficient work in a considerable proportion of cases can be carried out in a doctor's surgery and in the patient's home, work under such conditions has strict limitations. In any difficult or serious case, it is evident that the patient must be at great disadvantage compared with those who gain admission to a General Hospital. In the first place, the surroundings can never be as hygienic and convenient as they are in a modern hospital; secondly, a private practitioner cannot be expected to possess all the equipment and apparatus necessary for every variety of case; thirdly, amongst the poor there cannot be the constant care and supervision of a trained nurse, which is often essential to recovery; lastly, even amongst the rich it is extremely difficult to get all the special help that is advisable without injurious delay, whilst amongst the poor such help is often altogether impossible. Good equipment, good nursing, easy access to all varieties of specialist help and the best possible hygienic surroundings are essential in serious cases of illness. For economy of time, money and effort, and for dealing satisfactorily with any difficult or serious case, therefore, admission to a General Hospital where diagnosis and treatment are carried out by an organised staff of specialists on co-operative principles is what should be aimed at as the ideal. HOSPITALS AND GENERAL PRACTITIONERS In the past general practitioners have not formed part of the "Team" of a General Hospital. As a rule they lose all contact with their patients from the moment the latter enter the hospital until their return home, and even then they seldom receive any notification from the hospital concerning the diagnosis of the case and the treatment which has been adopted. This is altogether bad; from the patients' point of view there is no security for continuity of treatment, and from the doctors' point of view all interest in the case must be lost. Arrangements by which general practitioners can remain in close touch with their patients whilst under hospital treatment, whether as out-patients or in-patients, are very necessary. It would be better still if they could take an active share of the responsibility for the treatment of their cases as a recognised part of the honorary hospital staff. Not only would patients benefit thereby, but the doctors themselves would gain increased in- 2
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| Physical Description: | TEXT |