A CREDIT BALANCE

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 76, 16 April 1937, Page 3

A CREDIT BALANCE

l Our Own Ccirespondent.)

Wairoa Hospital Board

(From

-WAIROA, Last Night. A credit balance of £603 14/2 in the maintenance account and a credit in the capital account of £40 7/9 was reported by the chairman of the Wairoa Hospital Board in a statement on the year's workings. The reason for this credit can be ascribed nearly all to one item, the hospital being considerably understaffed in the nursing branch. This matter cannot be remedied until additions to the Nurses' Home are completed and when this is done the hospital will be able to function as a partial training school, the report stated. Our estimate providing for an average of 36 patients being treated daily in hospital was very near the mark, the actual avera,ge being 33.9, the first quarter alone accounting for the drop, as the last three quartera in the year averaged- exactly 36. Public Works activities did not commence to any great extent until July l, and this factor had a considerable bearing on the admissions of patients. Patients' fees were only £20'below the amount estimated, and would have been over £200 in excess had a certain cheque arrived a* week earlier. Having no pensioners boarded out locally, our charitable aid recoveries, mainly pe^isions, are very low, Hospital maintenance payments are nearly £700 below that allowed in the estimates, and despite a slightly lower occupied bed average than estimated, this amount saved is .due almost entirely to shortage of nurses. In this direction a much sharper increase will necessarily have to be budgetted for this year than last, owing to the shorter working week to be adoptcd. The cost per occupied bed under this heading was £189.6 and is therefore misleading for compaxative purposes. As it is, salaries and wages ie the only Item to exCeed our estimate under this sub-heading. * Outdoor xelief shows a weleome te1 duction of nearly £200 on last year, 1 and this. is accounted for mainly by new legislation - regarding pensions and » also the liiting of the depression. Payments to other boards continue to increase and a slight reduction -under this heading will be effected if Section 92 is repealed. Fortunately, our sanatoria cases are not many, and as Dr. Short has seen most of the likely patients in the past year there ehould be little change in the numbers tequiring sanatorium treatment. All projected works, with the exception of erecting a T.B. block, were carried out, and the surplus that should have been created by this exception was utilised towards the heavy increase in cost of extending the main ward and purchasing ambulance. -