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19
In this Report, then, I have determined to omit individual
details, and have sought to strike a level which may year by year
be compared with the levels of previous years and so give a broad
view of the results.
The simplest method which has occurred to me is to take a
definite point in the year and give a statement of the facts as they
then are. This, read in comparison and conjunction with the
similar statements of the previous years, will, as time goes on, form
a barometric reading of the work. All the various changes and
interchanges, new cases and deaths, progress and retrogression,
which are of daily occurrence, will be found on the broad average
of a year's work to level themselves out and will be reflected in
the statement of the annual level. These details are of course also
given in their totals, and the effect of any one of them which is
excessive can be noted.
The most obvious point to take to draw the summary is the
last day of the year, and in the following tables I have therefore
given the exact statement for the 31st December, 1915. The
corresponding statement for the 31st December, 1914, is also given
as far as possible. But as the records at that date were not so
complete as they are now, the statement is also not quite complete.
In each table the 1914 statement is given above and the 1915
below, and placed so that the corresponding columns are carried
downwards through the two years so that they may be easily
compared.
Thus, taking the first figures given of insured patients with
Pulmonary Tuberculosis (the common form of Consumption) we
see there were 132 malepatients with Tubercle Bacilli in the sputum
on the books on December 31st, 1914, as against 102 on December
31st, 1915, and so on for the other columns and tables.