DOMINION'S HOSPITALS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXII, Issue 19027, 26 May 1925, Page 9

DOMINION'S HOSPITALS.

CONFERENCE IN AUCKLAND. PROPOSALS FOR DISCUSSION. INCREASED FEES SUGGESTED. ' The first conference of the newly-formed Hospital Boards' Association will be held in Auckland to-morrow and on Thurs-! day. Delegates will be present from over 40 of the hospital boards of the Do* minion, and the ch&,ir will be taken by Mr. W. Wallace, chairman of the Auckland board and of the association's provisional committee. Tho proceedings will open at 10.30 a.m. ; at the Auckland Hospital, and it is hoped that all business will bo completed by Thursday afternoon. The delegates, however, are expected to remain in Auckland on Friday to attend tho official opening by the Minister for Public Health, Sir Maui Pomare, of the new Nurses' Home in the hospital grounds. Among the more important proposals to bo submitted by the provisional committee is the following:—"That the association is of opinion that the hospitals should be available to all who claim admission, and that all the medical practitioners should be concerned with i 3 whether the physical condition of the patient is such as to make him a fit subject for hospital treatment and whether he would benefit thereby." If the suggestion is adopted it will encourage, the admission to public hospitals of patients whose financial means usually involve treatment by private practitioners, and i.o ensure that this shall not impose any unfairness- on the honorary medical staffs who would treat such patients at the hospitals tho provisional committee recommends the adoption of the suggestion of the Director-General that the honorary medical staffs may be remunerated for whole or part-time services. One of the proposals which may be expected to meet with opposition is the committee's recommendation to hospital boards to raise their fees from 9s to at least 15s per day. The fee will, of course, be reduced to those unable to pay the full amount asked, and the committee proposes that the patient entering the hospital shall fill in an admission form embodying the proposed new scale, and that he shall be told that any reduction will depend upon the verification of the particulars given by him. Another proposal is that the Government be urged to pass legislation including hospital boards among those bodies to whom the State Advances Department may lend money. The committee also, suggests that approval be given to the Health Department's proposal to repeal the legislation dealing with the onus of relief to patients who are transferred from one district to another. An exception will be made as between contiguous boards. Disapproval of further subdivisions of hospital districts is expressed in another remit from the committee. Rules for the association will be submitted for approval, and two of the principal questions will be the fixing of the rate of subscription and the appointment of a secretary. Atfer considering the requests of one cur two boards for a lower subscription rate than that hitherto proposed, the committee expresses the opinion that it will be possiblo for the association to carry on adequately and efficiently on a contribution of l-1500th of a board s annual maintenance expenditure. The committee proposes that its election shall be biennial, and that each board J shall be entitled to one vote for/-every I 50,000 of the population in its district.