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re-allocation of the mental patients, which necessitated a considerable increase of
overcrowding, for the treatment of civilian and service sick and wounded. In all,
about 175,000 patients received treatment in the accommodation thus provided.
All that has been said in regard to the improvement in staff and equipment standards,
the provision of consultant and specialist services and the development of the
laboratory service at the general hospitals can be applied with equal force to the
mental hospitals and institutions. Many changes and much progress have been made
during the period of nearly sixty years that the Council has been responsible for these
hospitals but probably the most impressive advance was the change that has taken
place in the attitude to mental illness, which, of course, has been reflected in the
improved standards of care and the advance in the methods of treatment. All the
modern forms of treatment were provided in the mental hospitals.
In 1941, the administration of the mental hospitals, which up to then had been a
self-contained department, was transferred to the Public Health Department.
Certain of the hospitals which were alongside each other, one for acute and one
for the chronic sick, were placed under the same administration and therefore counted
as only one instead of two. Other hospitals were so damaged as to be wholly or
partly unusable. In the hospitals as a whole, 4,456 beds were completely destroyed
by enemy action. In some thousands more, war damage had not been repaired at the
time of transfer. Many wards had been taken over to replace departments which had
been destroyed and there were nearly 10,000 beds which could have been put into
commission if nursing staff had been available.
It has obviously not been possible in this report to do more than sketch the
outline of the development of the Hospital Service by the Council. A somewhat
longer account is given in the book "The L.C.C. Hospitals—A Retrospect." (Staples
Press, 7s. 6d.)
REPORTS BY THE DIVISIONAL MEDICAL OFFICERS
Division 1, comprising the boroughs of Chelsea, Fulham, Hammersmith and
Kensington.
Dr. H. Smith reports:
The first six months of the Council's administration were devoted to studying the
services taken over, adapting them, where necessary, to fit into the Council's administrative
methods (for instance in such matters as financial and supplies procedure),
and considering in what respects it was desirable to vary or supplement existing
services in order to make them more generally available. No attempt was made to
"standardise" the services, but where there were outstandingly good features in
one borough they were introduced in the rest of the division as occasion offered.
Examples of these were the extension of facilities for chiropody to Hammersmith
where no provision had previously existed; the pooling throughout the division of
maternity beds at Queen Charlotte's Hospital for women attending the Council's
maternity centres; or the establishment of exercise classes for pregnant women,
already functioning in Kensington, in another part of the division. Various adjustments
of existing facilities were made; additional sessions were provided at overburdened
clinics and a centre in North Hammersmith was closed and the patients
concentrated in a neighbouring centre, with more adequate and up-to-date premises,
lying just inside the borough of Kensington.
A useful link with the school girl population, from whom nursery staff are
recruited, was formed by arranging for school girls to volunteer for simple duties in
some of the day nurseries during the summer holidays.
Additional play equipment and toys were urgently needed in many of the day
nurseries. These have been provided from the Council's resources and the repair of
broken articles has been speeded up. Help, which was much appreciated, was given
by the boys at the remand home in Hammersmith and at some local schools.
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