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the consent of the police, cases of bandages and provisional surgical appliances in the seven
police stations of the town, as well as an ambulance stretcher, constructed after the model of
those used in the army; and later, in some of the police stations, a hand-cart for the transport
of injured persons. As, however, both stretcher and hand-cart were found to be unsuitable, and
therefore were seldom used, the society resolved to attach an ambulance carriage to every
police station. Such carriages have accordingly been placed at two of the police stations in the
inner town, and in the course of the present year it is anticipated that they will be supplied to
the remaining stations. The horse to draw the carriage may be requisitioned from the nearest cab
to be found, and the cabman is paid as for an ordinary course by the hour. The carriage can
be summoned by telephone, either through the police wire, or through that of the Telephone
Company, or through a private wire; and every police patrol carries in his note-book an instruction,
drawn up by the society, showing what telephones are handy to his beat for summoning the
ambulance carriage.
Vienna.
The Volunteer Humane Society of Vienna ("Wiener Freiwillige Rettungs-Gesellschaft")
was established after the burning of the Ring Theatre in 1881. It is supported entirely by
voluntary contributions, and its services to the public are given gratis. Its sphere of operations
is limited to the police area of the metropolis.
In case of fire the society can count upon the assistance of a volunteer fire brigade, consisting
of nearly 400 men, and furnished with a steam fire-engine and the necessary apparatus. It also
commands the services of 200 trained watermen, with boats and the newest appliances for saving
life.
Two hundred and twenty-one doctors and one hundred volunteer assistants (all medically
educated) are at the society's disposal.
During the last eight years there have been 12,159 cases of illness and injuries treated, and
24,000 sick transported, altogether 36,159 cases dealt with by the society. It has rendered
assistance on 2,139 separate occasions at fires, railway accidents, &c., and on 1,467 occasions it
erected temporary ambulances at places of public resort.
The society owns twenty ambulance waggons for the transport of sick and wounded, together
with a large number of other vehicles and sanitary appliances.
Twenty-five doctors, whose residences are distinguished by coloured lamps, have given
their services gratuitously to the society for night work. Their addresses are published in
a handbook containing a list of telephone numbers and the places, such as police stations, theatres,
tramway offices, Ac., where stretchers are to be had; also the names and addresses of the
sanitary assistants (" sanitats manner "). The society requests that the telephone may be employed
for communicating with its officials as being more expeditious than the telegraph.
Although the society limits itself to dealing with cases of illness, accidents, &c., which occur
in the streets of Vienna and in public places, exception is made when the civil or military
authorities require assistance if a medical man sends a certificate stating that a patient requires
to be immediately transported to a hospital. Cases of ordinary infectious disease are, however,
not transported by the society, but an exception is made in view of an epidemic of cholera, in
which event a special service of ambulances would be organised.
Paris.
The system of ambulances in Paris is entirely in the hands of the police. Paris is divided
into 20 arrondissements, each one of which contains four police stations and a commissariat
de police. A stretcher and a box of medical stores, necessary for the first dressing of a wound,
is kept at each police station and at the commissariat, and a list of directions as to the manner
of treating various injuries is put up in each police station. Stretchers and boxes of medical
stores are also kept at a certain number of fire brigade posts, at a certain number of guardrooms
of the republican guard, at all the cemeteries, and at some octroi posts. At any public
fete or demonstration where a large crowd is likely to be assembled, the police organise a special
ambulance known as an "ambulance volante." It consists of a doctor and two policemen, with
a stretcher and a box of medical stores. The police possess in Paris 219 hand stretchers,
requiring from two to six men to carry them, and 16 stretchers on wheels requiring only one
man; these latter are kept at the central police station of each arrondissement.
In the event of a person receiving a slight injury in the street, the gardien de la paix takes
him to the police station, or, if there is not one near enough, to a chemist's shop, and despatches
one of his colleagues to fetch the stretcher from the nearest police station; he is then conveyed
home or to the hospital. If he is in a position to defray his own expenses, he does so, if not,
they are paid by the Prefecture de Police.
Should the accident be of a more serious nature, the gardien de la paix telephones to the
Hospital St. Louis, the headquarters of the "ambulances urbaines," and a special ambulance
carriage, one of which is always kept ready harnessed, provided with a stretcher, and containing
the medical stores necessary for the first dressing of a wound, is at once despatched, accompanied
by a doctor, who conveys the injured person to the hospital or to his home.
The "Ambulances Urbaines" is a private philanthropic enterprise started at Paris two years
ago, and recognised by the police as being of the greatest service. This society operates in a
radius of several arrondissements, which is being constantly enlarged. It has a private telephone,
with thirty-five points of communication established in chemists' shops and police stations, the
central office being the Hospital St. Louis.
In the event of a person undergoing an injury in his own house, and wishing to be conveyed
to the hospital, there is no organised system of ambulance transport; the police station will
sometimes, on application, lend their stretcher, but in this case a regular report has to be made
to the Prefecture de Police.
In regard to Paris information of more recent date is contained in papers and in a statement
by Dr. Nachtel, forwarded to the Council in connection with the question of the need of an emergency
horse ambulance service for London.