OUR HOSPITALS

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXV, Issue 231, 16 September 1935, Page 7

OUR HOSPITALS

OUTSPOKEN CRITICISM

Australian Half-Guinea Fee

HALF-CROWN OF OLD ENGLAND

(By Telegraph—Press Assn.—Copyright.)

(Received 16, 11.55 a.m.) MELBOURNE, Sept. 16.

Much comment has been aroused by statements by Dr. Guy Dain, of Birmingham, at the final session of the medical congress, when he criticised the standard half-guinea fee charged by Australian doctors. He said that the basic charge for consultations at his surgery was half-arcrown. The Australian charges drove patients to consult chemists, Chinese herbalists and public clinics.

Dr. Dain blamed the high cost of Australian private medical services for the much-congested public hospitals. The lowest price of a bottle of medicine in Australia was 3/6, he said, whereas in the country areas of England doctors did their own dispensing. Dr. Dain also condemned the New Zealand hospital system, where hospital boards changed every two years, with a danger of frequent changes of policy and administration. Never had he seen anything more dreadful in hospital administration than that.

Defending the fees, Victorian doctors claimed that much of their work was done free and that much was done cheaply for lodge patients. Half a guinea enabled them to pick up on the swings w'hat they lost on the roundabouts. There could be no reduction while so much was done free.