HOSPITAL TREATMENT.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 14 March 1929, Page 2

HOSPITAL TREATMENT.

BURDEN OF MAINTENANCE. ißy Telegraph—rress Association.) PALMERSTON N., March 12. The vexed question of whether hospital boards are spending too much money in administration of hospitals, thus causing too heavy a drain oii the finances of local bodies, was referred to by the Minister of Health at the Hospital Boards’ Conference to-day. The Hon. A. J. .Stallworthy said hospital boards were to some extent the Cinderellas of local government services and were not always regarded with kindliness by their two elder (not to say ugly), sisters, the councils of counties and boroughs, yet this Cinderella, like the original in the fairy tale, had beauties which the elder sisters did not possess. Her work was not merely utilitarian but primarily humanitarian.

“It is from this aspect that the de- ■ partment’s difficulties can be seen,” said the Minister. “It is faced on one side with ever-growing demands for further provision for modern medical and surgical requirements so beneficial to the health >of the people, and on the ' other side is the protest from the contributory local authorities against the burden of Kbspital .board demands. Perhaps the latter sometimes fail to appreciate the economic value of hospitals. Taking the average duration in hospital in respect of each admission as 21 days (1927 figures), we have an aggregate sickness basis in the public hospitals of 220,000 weeks. If we admit that better hospital care and treatment gives at least a 50 per cent, better chance of recovery, we may presume that the hospitals in 1927 saved no less than 110,000 weeks of sickness or, on the basis of £4 per week, no I less a sum than £440,000. “How far in this far from perfect | world can the department expect the public to pay for such beneficial under-; takings? It is for this reason that a conference has been asked—to meet the department in a round-table conference in an endeavour to arrange some uniform and systematic method which will ensure that those receiving treatment will pay for it up to the limit of their ability, whilst those un--1 able to do so will not be harassed by demands that they ar e unable to meet. At present this important matter is left to the individual boards, and oftentimes to individual board secretaries, many of whom deal with each according to their views.”