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80
DEATHS IN PUBLIC INSTITUTIONS.
The only " large public institution" within the parish in
which we are directly interested, is the Parish Infirmary and
Workhouse, situated in the Town sub-district. There are
several minor public, or quasi-public institutions, but, with
one exception, they do not furnish occasion for special notice.
The excepted institution is St. Joseph's. House, Portobello
Road, Notting Hill—a Roman Catholic Home for aged poor
persons of both sexes, brought from various parts, principally
from Ireland; but the Registrar General does not
regard it as a public institution. The deaths of non-parishioners
at the Marylebone Infirmary, Notting Hill, (446), and
at the Brompton Consumption Hospital, (116), are excluded
from our statistics, but will furnish occasion for a few
remarks later on. The deaths of parishioners registered at
the Parish Infirmary and Workhouse, (322), and at out-lying
institutions, (160), were 482, or 18.4 per cent. on total deaths,
the percentage proportion of deaths in public institutions in
the Metropolis generally being 20.6. The addition of the
deaths at the Marylebone Infirmary, and Brompton Hospital
to those at the Parish Infirmary, would raise the percentage
in Kensington to 33.7.
The Parish Infirmary and Workhouse.—I am indebted
to Mr. H. Percy Potter, Medical Superintendent of the
Infirmary, and Medical Officer of the Workhouse, for the
statistics of mortality at these important institutions; the
former being, to all intents and purposes, as its name implies,
a hospital; it contains over 600 beds. The deaths, 322* in
number, were equal to 12.3 per cent. on deaths registered in
the parish; they were 15 in excess of the total in 1882, (307),
and 49 in excess of the total in 1881, (273). The deaths
comprised 164 of males, and 158 of females, the quarterly
totals being 102, 72, 67, and 81; so that 183 deaths occurred
in the first and last (or cold) quarters, and 139 in the second
*The number registered in 1883, was 318; other four occurring at the end of
December were not registered until the beginning of January, 1884.