Buller Hospital Board Meeting

Grey River Argus, 17 September 1948, Page 8

Buller Hospital Board Meeting

The Director-General of Health advised the Buller Hospital Board at its meeting last night, that the propisal to appoint an obstetrical registrar at Kawatiri Maternity Hospital had been approved. The Department proposed that the salary of £5O per anniim should include lectures in the event of the Hospital becoming a training centre. Dr. F. J. Wilson was appointed registrar. The Board was requested by the Director-General of Health to secure a practitioner before the end of the month, to replace Dr. Hutchins. The Union of Domestic Workers advised that laundry and sittingroom accommodation was being found for members of the domestic staff who lived in.

The Wages Commissioner approved of an increase of £25 per annum, as from October 1, 1947, in the salary of the medical superintendent, and £l5 for the resident house surgeon as from June 2, 1948. The State Fire Insurance Office' declined liability for broken glasses at Kawatiri Home. The Department of Health advised that the appointment of a district nurse foi’ the following duties had been approved:—To provide domiciliary nursing care in the district for general practitioners, by arrangement with the medical superintendent, and to supervise the treatment by nursing aids in the chronic female section of Kynnersley Wferd. Statistics.—Operations 54; outpatients 107; attendances 185; massage: inpatients 12, attendances 12<3, outpatients 31, attendances 249. X-ray: inpatients 63, exposures 98, outpatients 141, exposures 237. Patients admitted 50 male, 29 female, discharged, 41, 29, died, 2, nil, remaining, 45, 16.

The lady superintendent( Miss N. D. Watterson) reported that there had been no sickness on the nursing staff. No new members had come on the general staff. Sister Loasby had returned to duty. Staff Nurse Milne had resigned to take up duties in the Suva General Hospital. Nurse Levestam had resumed duty. The Denniston Hospital admittances had been 5, discharges 4, and births 2. The nursing staff was satisfactory at present. In the domestic staff, the cook had resigned, and they were endeavouring to find, a reliever. At Kawatiri Hospital the trained staff was satisfactory, but there seemed to be difficulty in getting nursing aids for this hospital. Admissions had been 21, discharges 26, and babies numbered 19. Remaining in hospital were 10 mothers and 10 babies. The inmates of Kynnersley Ward were all well.'One patient aged 92 years, has been transferred to the hospital. The Visiting Committee recommended that a concrete path be laid on the south side of the Kawatiri Maternity Home, that the nurses’' sitting-room and the nurses’ home be repapered and painted and that after painting of . the dining-room at Kynnersley. Ward, the passage-way adjoining the kitchen be painted.