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69
REPORT OF THE WOMAN INSPECTOR
Upon the work done in St. Pancras during the year 1912 in connection
with the prevention of Consumption.
The Numbers.
Paring the year 1912, the total number of cases notified as suffering from
Consumption was 1196. During the previous year the corresponding number
was 1015. These figures are of interest, in view of the fact that notification
of all classes of consumptive patients became compulsory at the beginning of
the year 1912.
A table giving details as to the composition of this total appears elsewhere.
We may note here in addition some figures of more special interest. The
" Homeless" were fifty in number. Sixteen men and two women were notified
from Common Lodging Houses, while sixty-one men came from Rowton
Houses. We had thus a total of 129 persons known to be pronounced or
advanced cases who were without any provision for adequate care, apart from
their intermittent stay in Poor Law Institutions. One of the women is
probably a typical case. When first notified several years ago she was a
respectable dressmakers' worker, living at a private address. After a considerable
interval she was notified as living at a Common Lodging House. When
last notified she appeared among the homeless.
At the beginning of the present year a Special Inquiry was made in order
to ascertain how many of those notified during 1912 remained at the same
address. Only 426 were found, and of these 128 were stated to be persons
insured under the National Insurance Act. It is significant of the uncertain
circumstances and advanced state of disease of those notified that so few were
found still resident at the addresses originally notified.
I desire here specially to mention the useful work done in connection with
this Inquiry by Miss Mary Giles, who was appointed to give temporary help.
She proved a most valuable assistant, and was well received, both by the
patients and by our many friends among the voluntary workers of the
Borough.
The Patients.
As has been noted in previous years the patients are for the most part
respectable and industrious persons, whose illness is due to no fault of their
own. In only twenty-one cases was the patients' home so dirty or uncared
for as to call for special comment on the part of the visitor. Many patients
were found working far beyond safe limits to maintain their homes, or to carefor
their families. In sixty-three cases the investigation papers contain notes
as to the inadequacy of the patients' food supply. No points of special
interest emerge as to the connection of industrial conditions with the disease,
except that a postman, a coal-porter, and a stoker complained of dusty conditions
; a newspaper tricycle boy of undue muscular strain ; a bandsman of
the lung strain involved in blowing his instrument; two basement workers of