The Death at the Hospital.

Wanganui Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 11166, 29 January 1904, Page 2

The Death at the Hospital.

TO THB EDITOR.

Sir, — There arc a few points in connection with the death of my poor wife at the Hospital which I think the public ought to know. First of all, either Dr Anderson or I must bo saying what is not true. I say emphatically be arranged definitely with me that the operation was to be performed on Saturday, lie says that there was no such arrangement. I Jeave the public to judge whether it would be likely that not oiie of the patient's relatives should bo in waiting if" they thought it possible that the operation was to take place on the day it did. Sir, I say again that Dr Anderson promised that the operation avus to be done on Saturday, and to have it a day earlier, when the patient's husband was fifty miles away, seems to mo a cruel piece of deception, even if she had lived.' But there is another thing in which the doctors (I don't know which) showed an utter disregard of our feelings. As soon, as the death took place a man was sent off to the relatives of the deceased: Tell them any way he liked ; they were only poor people, and were not supposed to have feelings at all. Dr Crawford told us in his evidence that he did not know what relatives deceased had; most likely he didn't care. The man- came to tho house where the mother of deceased lives and said: "Are you Mrs ?" He was told that she was. "Your daughter's dead !'' was his brutal answer. Words are needless. Further, docs not the evidence of the two' doctors contradict each other. Dr Crawford said he examined the patient and satisfied himself she was a fit subject for chloroform, but later<pn ho says he thought sjic was a bad subject ; and Dr Anderson admits that he toid me before the operation that the greatest danger was the chloroform. One says she is a fit subject, though he afterwards' contradicts himself, and the other says she is in most danger from chloroform. Who is right? Deceased was only a poor man's wife, and it didn't matter. The doctor's, with their learned sentences, can always make the jury believe that everything was done that could be done., but I do not think that tliis c; s will tend to make the public foci very certain that the best will bo dono for them or thcir's at our local Hospital. — I am, etc.,'

S. T. TUCKER.