View report page

35
the returns from the hospitals should again permit an analysis of the abnormalities
dealt with in the Council's wards.
During the year interesting experiments into a new form of analgesia in childbirth
were carried out with a trilene apparatus. The results were so satisfactory that the
experiment is being extended.
At the beginning of the year only three of the chronic sick hospitals were open,
viz., St. Alfege's II, St. John's and St. Pancras. The number of patients was 566.
With the return of the evacuated hospital patients later in the year the number
rose to 2,227 on 5th December, 1945, and the number remaining at the end of the
year was 2,188.
Chronic
sick
hospitals
Grave difficulties were experienced throughout the year, mainly owing to lack
of nursing and domestic staff, in providing the hospital beds needed for the treatment
of patients suffering from infectious diseases. At the period of greatest pressure
on accommodation in 1945, only 1,400 beds were available for fever patients, none
of which was in cubicle isolation accommodation. In the spring of 1938, there were
6,600 beds in use in fever hospitals, of which 570 were in single isolation cubicles.
Acute
infectious
hospitals
During the early part of the year, measles spread among the child population.
The number of measles patients admitted to infectious diseases hospitals was,
however, very small compared with pre-war epidemics, owing both to the dispersal
of the child population because of continued air attack, and to the strict limitation
of hospital admission to those who required hospital treatment by reason of clinical
severity or very bad home conditions. Similar restrictions were introduced for
scarlet fever, and only in the most exceptional circumstances were cases of chickenpox,
mumps and german measles accepted.
After the end of the war in Europe, action was taken to bring cubicle isolation
blocks into commission. (They had to be closed during the war because of the
danger from flying glass.) By 31st December, 1945, these had been brought into
use as follows:—
Eastern Hospital 30 beds
Park Hospital 60 „
Brook Hospital 82 „
Western Hospital 77 „
North-Eastern Hospital 103 „
Total 352 „
Work proceeded in the blocks at the North-Eastern Hospital which will provide
approximately 146 additional single cubicles. There remained, however, in other
hospitals 120 single cubicles in blocks seriously damaged or destroyed by enemy
action. The total number of infectious patients admitted during the year was 15,274,
of whom 3,496 were measles cases. The maximum number of patients under
treatment for infectious diseases was 1,244 on 21st March, 1945 (including 463 measles
cases).
Nine cases of suspected smallpox were admitted during the year to Clandon
Isolation Hospital, where, by agreement with the Surrey County Council, London
smallpox patients and those from certain other areas are received. Only two of
these patients were finally found to be suffering from smallpox.
Smallpox
Eleven cases of typhus were admitted to the North-Eastern Hospital during the
year. Of these seven were medical students, three service patients, and one civilian.
Typhus
St. Luke's Hospital, Lowestoft, remained closed throughout the year. All
available beds in the tuberculosis hospitals were occupied, except a number at
Grove Park Hospital and St. George's Home, which could not be opened owing
to a shortage of nursing and domestic staff.
Tuberculosis
hospitals
The Downs Hospital, Millfield Convalescent Hospital, Norwood Hospital for
Children, and St. Anne's Home remained closed throughout the year. Queen Mary's
Hospital for Children, which re-opened on 7th December, 1944, continued to provide
Children's
hospitals