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and endeavour to persuade the other inmates to come to this Dispensary for examination.
Appreciative replies have been received from the doctors, who have
unanimously shewn themselves anxious to help in the fight against consumption in
the Borough.
As a result a great many "contacts" have already been examined, and cases
discovered which would otherwise have escaped observation.
Two members of the Honorary Staff—Dr. Murray Leslie and Dr. Arthur
Phear—are available for consultation on the afternoons when the department is
open, and are always consulted by the Tuberculosis Officer in regard to diagnosis
and treatment.
The X-ray and other special departments of the hospital are open to the
Tuberculosis Officer, and the advantages the patients derive from the fact that the
Dispensary is situated in a hospital are inestimable.
After-care.
During the early part of the year an attempt was made to bring the work of
the Department under the notice of the various charitable agencies at work in the
district. Frequent meetings were held in the Tuberculosis Officer's Consulting
Room, and Cases which were regarded as being in need of assistance were brought
forward by the Medical Officer of this Department. In this way the Medical
Officer and the Tuberculosis Nurse were able to avail themselves of the co-operation
of the workers connected with the various charitable institutions.
The series of meetings were interrupted during the summer vacation and,
owing to the regrettable absence of Dr. Maitland, the Medical Officer of this
Department, on sick leave, they have not yet been resumed.
The fight against tuberculosis, as most people are aware, is necessarily a
protracted and very arduous one, and some of the pressing difficulties may be
mentioned.
(1.) Patients in whom the disease is too advanced for admission to Hospital or
Sanatorium.
These patients often act as a source of infection to those persons with
whom they come in contact, and at present, apart from the usual precautionary
measures, we have no remedy except to persuade them to go into an infirmary.
Suitable isolation homes for advanced cases not too far away from their
families would be a great boon to the community.
(2.) Patients returning from Hospital or Sanatorium with the disease improved
or arrested.
Most of these return to their usual work. A great many are, however>
quite unfit for their former employment, but have to go back to it as they are
unable to secure a new occupation at anything like a living wage. In consequence,
a recrudescence of the disease in an aggravated and often incurable
form is but too often the result.