HOSPITAL VISITORS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20392, 22 October 1929, Page 14

HOSPITAL VISITORS.

Sir, —The patient who complained of the harmful effect of visiting days at the Public Hospital has aptly expressed the opinion of numbers of patients and their relatives for years past. That recovery is retarded is evident to any observant person. The remedy is simple and" has been often practised. Place a notice of the by-law on the door of the wards on visiting days, and a quiet reference to same by the sister or charge nurse to the few who disregard it is sufficient, while the result is most gratifying to patients and staff. The visitors can help lessen the noise by wearing rubber-heeled shoes. Our patients ask little; let us all do what we can to ease pain and hasten recovery. Auckland Trained. Sir.—Some time since both my daughter and myself underwent serious operationn in the Auckland Hospital. I feel*' therefore that I ain in a . position to say how fully I endorse the opinions of your correspondent in last Friday's Herald. A few hours after coming from the' operating theatre, when one's |)old on life seem:s very weak, the patient in the next bed has perhaps 10 visitors all at once, all of whom stay the full period. It is perhaps a wet night and their mackintoshes and umbrellas reek and steam, and children are brought, which one knows is often unavoidable, but adds to the, general unrest. The result on the - nerves' of a patient feeling like d r ith can be imagined. This is no imaginative picture, but actually happened to rie. No more than two visitors should bo admitted at the same time to any one patient, and this should be done by transferable ticket. Finally the lights have to be turned down and out to force the visitors to go and the evening attention to the patients is sometimes hurried or omitted. Nevertheless I am still A Gratefdl Patient.