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17
6. SUMMARY (FOR REFERENCE) OF NURSING ARRANGE
MENTS, HOSPITALS, AND OTHER INSTITUTIONS
AVAILABLE FOR THE DISTRICT.
(a) Nursing in the Home.
(i) The Plaistow Maternity Charity provide a staff of nurses,
who attend at the homes of the sick once or twice a day, carry
out such skilled nursing as is required, and offer instructions
where advisable in hygienic home practices in relation to the
sick.
(ii) For infectious diseases. In the event of an epidemic,
the Council can provide nurses for such cases as may require
to be nursed in their own homes. This course of action has
been taken in some areas with special reference to scarlet fever,
but it will be, I believe, a long time before such action becomes
general.
It has been stated that ailments such as scarlet fever and
measles, to which so much attention has been given, have received
the attention they have more because of the rash with which
they are accompanied than because of their intrinsic powers of
disablement, and certainly it must be said that other infectious
diseases, such as rheumatic affections of the throat, are equally
important by reason of the complications which are involved
and are equally deserving of isolation and of special hospital
treatment.
It seems to me, therefore, fairly evident that, whilst there may
be a re-distribution of the classes of cases which are to be isolated
in the future, the actual need for such hospital beds is likely to
increase rather than diminish.