View report page

69
Return Gases, i.e., cases occurring in a house within a
few days of the return of a patient from Hospital. In previous
years particulars have been supplied by the Metropolitan
Asylums Board of cases admitted to Hospital from houses to
which they had previously discharged another patient, but during
1904 this information was not supplied, but of course was
obtained by the Sanitary Inspectors in the course of their
investigations.
During the year 1904 return cases have been far less
frequent than in previous years. This may possibly be due to
an altered system adopted by the authorities, in which some
patients are, during the later stages of the illness, transferred to
convalescent hospitals before being returned to their homes.
Information is sent to the Health Department from the
Hospital of patients due for discharge to their homes, and a
letter is dispatched to parents or persons having charge of such
patients giving the precautions which should be taken on the
patients return in order to avoid the risk of imparting the disease
to others.
SCARLET FEVER.—The total number of cases notified
during the year amounted to 389, compared with 466 in 1903,
and 651 in 1902.
Of these cases 269, or 79 per cent. of the total, were
removed to the Metropolitan Asylums Board's Hospitals.
Subsequently, 17, or 6.3 per cent. of the cases admitted to
Hospital, were returned to their homes and stated to be not
suffering from any infectious disease. Deducting this number,
a corrected total of 322 is obtained, equal to an attack rate of
2.29 per 1,000 persons, a marked decrease compared with the
attack rate of 3.28 for the year 1903, and 4.81 in 1902. (See
Table 21.)