OPEN-AIR TREATMENT

Evening Post, Volume XCI, Issue 5, 7 January 1916, Page 2

OPEN-AIR TREATMENT

NEW HOSPITAL SYSTEM.

MARVELLOUS RESULTS

OBTAINED.

At this week's meeting of the Nelson Hospital and Charitable Aid Board a letter was read from tho Minister for .Health (Hon. G. W Russell), stating that he would visit Neteon shortly^ to confer with the Board in regard to the plans of the. new general .hospital. In the course of his letter the Minister Said that he was very strongly of opinion that tho whole scheme of hospital construction and erection . had up to tho present been on unsound lines. Since tho present war started a great experiment had been conducted in the Great Eastern Hospital at Cambridge, where many thousands of sick and wounded soldiers had been dealt with on a death-rate of 4 per .1000. These figures had attracted the widest attention throughout England,* and meant a reversal of the theory of hospital construction, because tho Cambridge . scheme had been the openair treatment.' Instead of hospitals at a cost of £3000 per bed, it was now found that by the erection of hospitals at a cost of from £12 to £15 per bed better results were obtained—:thu men ptactical'.y living in the open air The experiment had been stested at Trentham and at other places, and marvellous results in the way of curing and healing had come about from adopting the openair method of curing, which was found ■to apply not only to consumption, but to all diseases. At the Waikato Hospital at Hamilton an open-air ward was erected some years ago, and tTiere also the results had been surprising—surprising beyond expectation; The Minister said he intended to sngsrest to all Hospital Boards in future that the scheme of hospital construction in New Zealand should be revolutionised on the following lines:—

That the administrative block, consisting of medical and nurses' quarters, shall be of a substantial character, but that the wards in which the patients are located for treatment shall be of lighter material, and prnctirnlly open to frcrch air both day and night. If it meant a little delay in connection with the erection of the Board's buildings, the' Minister-thought that the delay would be well compensated for by the increased efficiency which the institution would attain.