Elderly Sick "Clamour" To Leave Hospitals

Press, Volume C, Issue 29563, 12 July 1961, Page 14

Elderly Sick "Clamour" To Leave Hospitals

‘This is a madhouse—get me out before I lose by reason” has been the plea of many elderly hospital patients clamouring to get into a Christdburch old people's home, according to the chairman of the Christohuroh Aged People’s Welfare Council (Dr. H. R. Donald).

“Of the many fruitless applications for a bed in the infirm wing attached to one of the residential homes in Christchurch." says Dr. Donold, in a letter to the “New Zealand Medical Journal.” “not a few come from inmates of hospitals, even as far away as Cornwall in Auckland. The reasons for their applications ere so often similar—'this is a madhouse — get me out before I lose my reason*.” Dr. Donald criticises re-cently-published views of Dr. J. L. Newman and Dr. I. C. Macintyre. medical superintendents of the Green Lane Hospital. Auckland, and the Burwood Hospital. ”1 was a little surprised at tiieir outright condemnation of the infirm wing attached to a residential home.” says Dr. Donald. “Dr. Newman dubbed them 'dangerous.' Dr. Macin'tyre ‘pointless.’ The basis of their disapproval is, I

think, a failure to appreciate that the infirm wing caters for a milder grade of infirmity than the long-stay hospital annex. “Unpleasant Death”

“Mental acuity frequently survives mere physical decay. Under these conditions, to be buried alive in a geriatric ward of a general hospital, surrounded by cerebrosclerotics, is a particularly unpleasant form of mental suffocation and death —and not merely for the spectator. In an old folk's home you can remain more closely integrated with the mental stimulus and the life of the community, surrounded by your friends, still cared for by your personal doctor. “Most doctors—particularly general practitioners—spend a large proportion of their time in the care of long-term sickness in the aged. If Dr. Newman takes this from them the bottom would fall out of many practices, and the roof fly off the long-stay hospital annex. If he really doubts the practitioners’ competence, would it oot be a step in the right direction to concentrate at least some of their charge* in the infirm wing of the local welfare home, where some supervision would be given by the regional geriatrician of the local hospital board?” Dr. Donald compares the

cost of hospital beds with that of beds in old people's homes At the Princess Margaret Hospital, he says, it is £47 9s 8d a week; at the Jubilee Home —a residential home with an infirm wing—£9 9s 6d; and at a privately-run home in Christchurch for frail ambulants. £4 Is. “Dr. Macintyre condemns these infirm wings solely because of staffing problems." Dr. Donald adds. "There is, of course, a shortage of trained nurses throughout the country, but I was not aware that the problem was any more marked —if as bad—in the small residential homes than, for example, at the Princess Margaret Hospital. •To many hundreds of frail ambulants. the residential home is their home, and the attached hospital wing cares for them when they are sick, be it for a week or for the rest of their lives. The only thing wrong with many of these wings is that they are not big enough, and the only thing wrong with the residential homes is that there are not enough of them. Homes tn Suburbs "Just as today the new suburbs of a growing city aye not complete without their day nurseries and their schools, so in the future each district will demand its own centre for the elderly, to provide accommodation for the frail and grade 1 infirm (those who in happier circumstances could be nursed in their own homes by their own relations). Community facilities for companionship and occupation, rehabilitation, and day care must also be made available at these centres. Who is going to provide then?

Dr. Donald suggests that the Central Advisory Committee for the Care of the Aged and the district aged people’s welfare councils could become the nucleus of a department of social welfare.

“Problems of this magnitude demand the formation of a national policy and a national authority," he says. Each of the membe.li of such an authority, he adds, "must be prepared to sacrifice some of its vested interests. The Health Department must confine Itself to health, the Social Security Department to social security. The churches should accept the fact that 50 per cent, of supervised accommodation should be free of sectional interest and sponsored by the community. “Every organisation that runs a residential home erected with the help o* public funds should be prepared to co-operate on the basic principles of over-all policy, and with the recommendations of a common admissions committee.”