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GENERAL PROVISION OF HEALTH SERVICES
Hospitals.
The situation in regard to the availability of hospital beds is still
more or less the same as that recorded in my Annual Reports for
the last few years. Difficulties met with still centre round the
provision of sufficient beds for the chronic sick, particularly the
elderly chronic sick. Difficulties have also tended to increase in
regard to the provision of maternity beds, although these latter
difficulties have been more or less associated with the temporary
closure of maternity blocks, due to infection and other causes.
So far as the provision of beds for the chronic elderly sick is
concerned, this is a matter which I have continued to pursue with
the utmost vigour, for quite a time. I have never hesitated to make
it known to such Committees as the North Middlesex Liaison
Committee (British Medical Association) and the Northern Group
Medical Advisory Committee, both of which committees are
intimately concerned in this matter, that the position in Southgate
is very far from satisfactory. The main difficulty seems to lie in
the fact that the hospital which should act as a geriatric reservoir
for Southgate (Highlands Hospital) is never able fully to do so
because of its commitments in inner London. Bearing in mind the
fact that Highlands Hospital is becoming increasingly known as
the general hospital which serves Southgate residents, and remembering
the very high proportion of old people living in Southgate,
the position becomes even more intolerable.
I am sometimes told that Southgate is a wealthy district, that
poverty is not one of our major problems, that we must remember
the hardship of such a poor district as Islington, the area from
which many geriatric cases are admitted to Highlands Hospital My
reply is always the same. We have a very high percentage of old
people; many of our old folk are living on a pension, and although
they do not flaunt their difficult position, it needs very little
imagination to appreciate their situation. We have in Southgate
a hospital which we regard with affection and high esteem; this
hospital is prepared to admit our cases but is unable to do so
because of its other heavy commitments. As this Report is written,
I understand that some alteration in the catchment areas so far as
geriatric cases are concerned is being made, that there is every
likelihood of Highlands Hospital being able to give us a very much
better service. We can only hope that this will, in fact, prove to be
the case. We at least know that Highlands Hospital, with which
we maintain the most cordial relations, is only too anxious to assist
us in the solution of our geriatric problems.
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