HOSPITAL CONFERENCE.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXIX, Issue 109, 29 June 1911, Page 5

HOSPITAL CONFERENCE.

IMPORTANT RESOLUTIONS. (Per Press Association.) Wellington, June 28. At the Hospitals Conference to-day, Dr. Yalintine, Inspector-General, read a paper on ‘“The Incipient Mental and •Delirium Tremens Patient,” urging that such cases should be treated in hospitals in their early stages, as they could often be restored to health without having a stigma to bear which attached to the patient themselves and their families from the fact of their being in mental hospitals. The v conference did not agree with Dr. V alintine, and passed a resolution recommending the Government to make provision in those centres where required for receiving houses in connection with mental hospitals for the rreatxnent of incipient mental and~\ielirium tremens patients. Other resolutions passed wore to the following effect:—That the Government be requested to introduce.legislation giving hospital and charitable aid boards power of detention over inmates of benevolent homes, hospitals, sanatoria or other institutions under the Boards’ control in cases where the Health - Department conskiers it necessary in the interests of the community.

That legislation bo passed as soon as possible transferring control of contagious diseases directly from the Department of Native Affairs to the Public Health Officers. That in order to conserve tho Maori race tho question of maternity and infant mortality should he dealt with directly by responsible officers of hospital and charitable aid boards, and as a further guarantee of. this the Native race should bo brought with Europeans under the Registration Act, and this should be applicable, not only to deaths, but also to births and marriages. That homes for indigent imbeciles and destitute blind children mentally able to benefit by being taught to road under tho Braille or any other sy stem, be provided by r the State. That this conference affirms the necessity of founding State schools for defective girls similar to that established for boys at Otckaikc, and State homes with powers of detention fo< women of feeble character whose proclivities are a source of danger to the community both from a physiological and a moral point of view. That the conference recommends the Inspector-Clou oral of Hospitals to circularise all Hospital Boards with regard’ te the successful working or otherwise of the eight hours’ system as applied to nurses. Tho conference resumes to-morrow.'