Patients Stay Shorter Time In Hospitals

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30739, 1 May 1965, Page 19

Patients Stay Shorter Time In Hospitals

Although the average total number of occupied beds in the hospitals of the North Canterbury Hospital Board during the year ended March 31 was practically identical with the total 11 years ago, the number of patients treated was 57 per cent higher than at that time, says the board’s secretary (Mr J. G. Laurenson) in his annual report. The population in the board’s area rose 27 per cent over the same period, and the number of available beds was 7 per cent higher at the end of the period than at the beginning. The figures for 1964-65 included the St. Helens Hospital for the first time, but according to Mr Laurenson “the table confirms the view that the number of patients treated is increasing at a greater rate than the number of available or occupied beds or the popu-

lation. On the average, one person in every 11 in the board’s district was a patient in the board’s institutions during the year.”

The number of patients treated a bed at the Christchurch Hospital in 1964-65 was 28.9, compared with 26.9 in 1963-64 and 24.9 in 1962-63.

Other Christchurch Hospital statistics for 1964-65 (1963-64 and 1962-63 in brackets) were: average occupied beds 375.6 (382.2; 408.6), total of patients treated 10,736 (10,286; 10,172), cost a patient treated £92.8 (£93.5; £89.4).

The only form of collective security which will work in the end is one which will bring us together not only with our political friends but also those who disagree politically with us. Denis Healey, British Defence Minister.