Mental Hospitals
Sir, —“West Coaster” talks of people who rush into print with wrong impressions. I understand that Sunnyside (partly through limitations imposed by poor accommodation) is one of the most backward; and one of the few mental hospitals in New Zealand with a “locked door” policy, but new villas can help more enlightened treatment. Model hospitals (“the small therapeutic community In close touch with
the outside world”) should be established at Timaru and Invercargill, but the whole position wants full inquiry. I have never criticised those who care for the ill at Sunnyside; I have drawn attention to the severe limitations under which they work. We should have preventive hygiene to save people from “break-down,” out-patient facilities, adequate help from psychologists, psychotherapists, and psychiatric social workers, and better “open door” accommodation in hospital, adequate “follow up” treatment and adequate renumeration for qualified staff. The doctors are over-burdened and conscientious. —Yours, etc., DOUGLAS C. McKECHNIE. Geraldine, March 18, 1958.
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Bibliographic details
Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28539, 19 March 1958, Page 3
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159Mental Hospitals Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28539, 19 March 1958, Page 3
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