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16
HEALTH SERVICES OF THE AREA
HOSPITALS
Although there is in the district a general hospital, the Harrow
Hospital at Roxeth Hill, Harrow-on-the-Hill, with some 120 beds, that
which serves most of the area is the Edgware General Hospital situated
just outside the district on the Edgware Road. It has some 700 beds
and maintains a very comprehensive out-patients department. It has
three annexes in the district for elderly persons, one the old Stanmore
Cottage Hospital, another at Orme Lodge, Stanmore, and the other the
Roxbourne Hospital which was formerly the South Harrow Isolation
Hospital.
Bushey Maternity Hospital, lying just outside the northern boundary
of the district, is another annexe of this hospital which caters for uncomplicated
maternity cases. Just over the boundary in another direction
in Wembley is the Kingsbury Maternity Hospital, associated with the
Charing Cross group of hospitals. A very high proportion of mothers
are admitted to these hospitals and to London hospitals for their confinements.
So many apply early in their pregnancy for admission that at
times insufficient beds have been left for the admission of those who
make later application and who have consequently to be refused, even
though there may be special circumstances making admission desirable
and even necessary. In his Annual Report for 1955 the Chief Medical
Officer of the Ministry of Health says: "It is desirable where practicable
that all primigravida over the age of 30, multiparae over the age of 40.
those having their fourth or more confinement and all mothers with
multiple pregnancies as well as special medical or social need cases should
have their babies in hospital."
Infectious cases are admitted to the Hendon Isolation Hospital in
Goldhawk Avenue, Hendon.
The other hospital in the district is the Stanmore branch of the
Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital.
Particulars of the hospital services including details of out-patient
facilities were set out in the Annual Report of 1954. No changes in
these arrangements were made in this last year. The first stage of the
erection of the Charing Cross Hospital at Northwick Park appeared in
the 1957/58 programme which the Minister of Health announced in
February, 1955.
NURSING HOMES
These are private establishments which provide accommodation for
varying types of patients. Section 187 of the Middlesex County Council
Act requires that these homes shall be registered.
At the beginning of the year there were 15 of these homes in this
district. They had a total of 193 beds, of which 16 were for maternity
cases. There were no changes during the year.
Before the war there were in the district a number of small nursing
homes, each of which accepted a few elderly persons suffering from slight
disabilities. The homes were mainly run by nurses living in their own
houses. They met a very real need. It is unfortunate that today when