ROTORUA HOSPITAL.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXVII, Issue 17936, 1 November 1918, Page 5

ROTORUA HOSPITAL.

TREATMENT OF SOLDIERS. INADEQUATE ACCOMODATION. [Per Pbbss Association.] _ AUCKLAND, October 31. Reporting on the conditions at Rotorua Hospital, the committee says:— "Every opportunity was, given to see everything we wished to inspect at Rotorua, but from telegraphio instructions which we saw the officers in charge were not free to supply any statistics of the pa,st, nor were they authorised to express any opinions regarding the effectiveness of tne methods of treatment and duration of the same, or adequacy of tho accommodation. The sanatorium was originally built for about forty patients, but has N been enlarged by a hotch-potch of additions to accommodate say ninety, in a more or less makeshift manner. The sanatorium is a decidedly unattractive looking place. The inside wards are dismal with,a general aid of shabbiness. Toe fioor coverings are worn and threadbare, while a fresh coat of paint all round would make a great improvement. The smoking and sitting-room could hardly be more cheerless and uncomfortable, and some effort should be made to render it more homelike. At presont.it is calculated to give any patient the blues by its depressing tone. In the bath house there have been no structural additions during the war. The accommodation for massage treatment in the bath house is pitiably itfmall, and already congested. Rooms originally designed for one patient at a time are now accommodating three, four or more. To illustrate tne scale Of increase of treatments in the bath bouse, during December, 1915, there were 645, while for August, 1918, there were 4000. Tho electric apparatus is also overworked, and it seemed that twenty Brimstowe batteries instead-of two could be effectively used. A makeshift policy is here allowed to exist also, and the men's treatment cannot but be delayed by it." > "On the question of hospital accommodation for orthopaedio treatment," continued the report, " Sir James Allen had mado the statement that 80 per cent of returned wounded needed sonic orthopaedic or curative treatment, and that the North Island surgical hospital to be established at Rotorua is to contain 186 beds. This tho committeo thought inadequate.! Orthopaedio treatment certainly averaged six months per patient. During the past six months about 5000 returned soldiers had arrived in New Zealand. Assume that half of those were not wounded and did not reouire special treatment; of the other half say 80 per cent, or 2000, required Orthopaedic treatment, half each in (ho North and the South Islands, the question was how could the treatment of these 1000 possibly be provided in the ! proposed North Island orthopaedic establishment and workshops without evacuating men as outpatients before their treatment is fully complete, and thus running the risk of retarding their ultimate recovery?, Such a number of patients required a huge establishment of trained masseurs, which did not exist at present. The problem was a difficult one, but it was evident that some of the returned men were bound to suffer from lack of efficient treatment, or at least from delay." Regarding To Waikato Sanatorium, the report of the committee states that the demand is so great that discharges have to take place at the end of three months, whether the patients are cured or not cured. The tendency is for the patient to hide his complaint, and, consequently, his intermingling with,others causes infection. It is idle, the roport continues, to discharge men at tho end of three months, telling them that they have been taught to take care pf themselves. There is really no practical way in which 90 per cent of the infected men can continue the treatment outside of a recognised institution. "We are informed," the report proceeds, " that 700 or 800 returned men here suffered from tuberculosis, and the majority should be under treatment, or, at least, observation for, say, two years. Only 81 of them are at Te Waikato. The erection of the new sanatorium at Waipukurau has not yet been commenced, but it is stated that the patients from Te Waikato are to be removed there. The plans provide for only eighteen single-bed'shelters, twenty-nine two-bed shelters and wards for fourteen beds, a total of ninety, so that from tho moment of opening, say, nine or ten months hence, there will be the same congestion as exists now, with presumably the same reckless discharge of uncured patients. Even if Te Waikato is continued, the joint accommodation will be too small."