Health system criticised

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33987, 30 October 1975, Page 5

Health system criticised

There was something, basically wrong with a system in which a person had to he had enough to need hospital treatment before they were worth receiving any treatment. Dr D. Anderson, said at a seminar on treatment need> in the area of dependency, in Christchurch yesterday. We must surely put our efforts into preventing i people getting to this damaged state. The fact that we are only trying to treat the most severe and difficult cases must be one of the factors causing despondency

i and pessimism in those confronted with the alcholic i patient.” Dr Anderson said. Dr Anderson, who is in charge of the drug addiction i centre at Princess Margaret Hospital, said that perhaps the present generation of patients with chronic alcoholism were like chronic mental hospital patients — too far advanced, and damaged. to be effectively treated At the moment there was a tendency to see hospital treatment as the best treatment, and treatment in any other setting as second-rate. “A tendency of hospital services to take over patients too readily helps to underline this philosophy. In fact, treatment in the community is the best treat-

ment Hospital treatment is an admission of defeat, ft means that the condition has been allowed to become so advanced as to require referral to a hospital,” he said. Institutional care reduced family involvement especially when the hospital was remote from the community. “Changes in the family equilibrium of forces is essential when this caused the alcohol problem.” Dr Anderson said. It is essential that, a detoxification unit be set up m Christchurch, as an independent entity, but with close ties in a general hospital, he said. ‘‘Drying the alcoholic out is not enough in itself. There should be a system of

(hostels, and sheltered acicommodation,” he said. "It is time we stopped thinking of alcoholism as a medical problem alone.

■ "It is time we stopped I relying on a non-profes-sional group (Alcoholics Anonymous) to do our work for us. “It is time to see treatment in the community as the best treatment, and hospital treatment as an admission of defeat, and sec-ond-rate treatment because it disrupts the individual’s social integration.” The main need was a change of attitude in the community, and in the professions. Alcoholism was preventable and, in the early stages, treatable, he said