A NEW HOSPITAL

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 127, 25 November 1938, Page 4

A NEW HOSPITAL

CHILDREN'S CASES

BOARD ASKS FOR REPORT

NEED EMPHASISED

Unanimous agreement about the leed for a new children's hospital was jxpressed at last night's meeting of '.he Wellington Hospital Board when, ;it the instance of Mrs. Knox Gilmer, the building committee of the board was asked to report on the following questions:—What types of case should be treated at the Newtown hospital and at the proposed Lower Hutt hospital; whether the board should provide a separate institution for orthopaedic cases; what number of beds was likely to be required for these purposes; in what directions could the present children's hospital be altered and improved.

Mrs. Knox Gilmer said that much criticism had been levelled at the conditions in the children's hospital, and the main cause of it was tlie crossinfection that was taking place. Members of the board, she thought, did not fully appreciate that the hospital had been closed during the last few months because of epidemics. Children entered with one complaint and before they were discharged they might have contracted two or three others. Naturally their constitutions-must be weakened. They must care for the children properly. Isolation must be one of the main facilities of tlie hospital. Then; there were the children with .tubercular bones. Those children were being sent home and were not getting the best conditions available to recover in a minimum period. "Some of the children that are sent out of the children's hospital are not getting the chance that every child should get." said Mrs. Gilmer. "The Commission in its report said that the hospital should be remodelled. It realised that the children were not getting sufficient sunshine and it recommended that a sun-room should be constructed on the roof. The estimate given to the Commission was £2630, yet we find now that it is to be £3500, which, with £4000 for the theatre, makes the total estimate. £7500. I. do not approve of the sun-room, as it would be totally inadequate. Whether or not the board considered the recommendation of the Commission to build an orthopaedic hospital, it will have to face up to the position. The children are not getting the treatment they should be getting. The children's hospital has been the Cinderella of the whole reconstruction of the Wellington HospitaL" She asked that the building committee should bring down a full report. "DISGRACE TO CITIZENS." Mr. A. W. Croskery seconded the motion. He said that every member of the board would support the motion. The present children's hospi-* tal was a disgrace to the citizens of Wellington. The old board had a proposal in the original plans for one of the mos.. beautiful children's hospitals in the Southern Hemisphere. "We should make provision for a children's hospital in this city," he said. "We can afford to do it,,and can afford to build for the coming generation; we can afford to put them into a decent hospital and give them decent treatment. Everything possible is done for the children now, but the staff are working under very great hardship. The conditions surrounding their work are pitiful."

Mr. W. J. Mason expressed his alarm at the reports of cross-infection in the children's hospital. He agreed that there was urgency in the matter of accommodation, not only for children but for adults as well He thought the building committee should bring down a report as to what should be done about the present old hospital at Newtown. It was no good tackling the! questiQn bit by bit.

Mrs. M. Dowse and Mr. W. Atkinson also spoke in favour of the proposal, and stressed the need for giving the children the best possible care.

Mr. A. H. Carman agreed with Mr. Mason that at the first opportunity they should decide what they were going to do with the Wellington Hospital.

At a later stage, Mr. Croskery mentioned the need for more land at the Wellington Hospital. He had heard that a new residence was to be built for the Governor-General somewhere else, and he thought the board should approach the Government and let it know that the board could do with the land in the event of its being available, f