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54
SUPPLEMENT.
Items of interest concerning the Health Service administered by the
Middlesex County Council as Local Health Authority.
Home Nursing Service.
The volume of work carried out annually by the Home Nursing
Service in Ealing has shewn a steady increase since the service was
taken over by the Middlesex County Council from the Greater
Ealing and the Northolt Nursing Associations in 1948, until the
year just completed, when the figures remained similar to those of
the preceding year.
The staff at present is the equivalent of 26¼ full time nurses
and is made up of 22 full-time nurses including 2 male nurses and
9 part-time nurses. There is at present working in Ealing an
additional male nurse who is still under contract. In 1948, at the
time the County took over the administration of the service there
was a staff equivalent to 14¼ nurses consisting of 13 full time and
4 part-time nurses.
For the last four years detailed figures have been kept of the
classified diseases which the nurses are asked to attend, the types
of treatment undertaken and the age groups of the patients.
Certain points of general interest have emerged from studying the
figures for the last two years. During 1954, the total number of
visits made was very nearly the same as the number in 1953 (87,159
and 87,076 respectively) although there was a 20% reduction in the
number of new cases attended (4,747 in 1953 and 3,763 in 1954).
This reduction in new cases was proportionately greater in the
younger age-groups although all the age-groups showed a decrease.
There was, however, a 25% increase in the number of cases having
25 or more visits during the year.
A big reduction in the number of cases of respiratory disease
accounts for more than 50% of the decrease in total cases as between
1953 and 1954, and the decrease occurred principally in the first
quarter of the year. This is probably explained by the aftermath
of respiratory disease in the first quarter of 1953 following the
" smog " of December, 1952, and this explanation is borne out on
referring back to the figures collected in the first quarter of 1952
which correspond closely to those of the first quarter of 1954.
On the other hand, it must be borne in mind that the increasing
use of long acting penicillin injections may considerably affect
these figures.
In addition to the big reduction in new cases of respiratory
disease there were smaller reductions in most other classified
diseases, the exceptions being those classified under New Growths
Vascular Lesions of the Central Nervous System, Diseases of