The Taihape Daily Times AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE SATURDAY FEBRUARY 15, 1919 HOSPITAL PROGRESS.

Taihape Daily Times, 15 February 1919, Page 4

The Taihape Daily Times AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE

SATURDAY FEBRUARY 15, 1919 HOSPITAL PROGRESS.

,(With which is incorporated The Taibape Poat tad WalEwilio Newo).

The people of this rapidly growing district will be gratified to learn thai there is at last a determination to make the Taihape hospital fulfil' inc conditions for which such institutions are usually fore-or.dained. Our views are in hearty concurrence with those expressed at the Hospital Board meeting, held this week, by Mr. Battle, who strongly urgei that more use should be made,of the Taihape hospital, more especially as accommodation at the Wanganui hospital is becoming more and more limited. Too long has the Taihape hospital been treated as an outhouse to Wanganui, built chiefly to please a few people who realised the extreme need and who were willing to find what money was requisite to .build it, and it is only when questions of human life are brought before the Board, which it cannot but view In one way, are steps taken to cause the hospital to be put to its fullest legf'binate use. From the discussion at the Board meeting there is now no doubt about members having become impressed with the requirements of this district, and with the prospective possibilities of what the institution may rapidly develop into. Taihape is the centre of an immense district so far situated from Wanganui that it is surprising anyone should harbour the old idea that it is either safe or humane to rail cases of accident and infectious disease over a hundred miles, changing from train to train at Martou, to ( Wanganui; but the lately raging epidemic with its unfortunate and appalling circumstances in Taihape will probably have modified such ideas or have dissipated them altogether. It is proved beyond question that Taihape hospital is the natural centre in times when the public health and life is in jeopardy, for during the late epidemic the majority of cases came from outlying districts from farther north than Ohakune and from as far south as Hunterville. The public hospital could not cope with the difficulty owing to inability to secure the staff requisite. There was the newly erected infectious ward available, not used at all because nurses and attendants were not obtainable, and had the district been left to the mercy of the institution from which the public naturally look for the organisation of means for dealing with such dire visitations, it is positively terrifying to think of what might have been the result. But when the hospital failed the Mayor of the town and a committee of helpers not only found most suitable buildings for a temporary hospital and nurses' rest house, but they also found a staff of ready and willing workers, who with only an hour or two of rest in the twenty-four did all it was humanly possible under the circumstances to save the lives of those who came under their care, and they succeeded bcyond'all that was expected of them. We do not "blame individuals for the failure of the hospital in Lime of utmost need, the hospital system is wrong, operating in the minimum results only being obtained from such an institution. There has been a chain of management from the Board down, and when any link of that chain became unfit or was removed there was collapse. It is distinctly wrong to follow a course of reasoning which •admits of tho whole institution losing its very nature to the total or partial loss of its functions because one person is HI or unable to 'perform his or her usual duties, and it is In this connection local government becomes absolutely essential It is not a brickmaking business that is in question, it is the saving of valuable human life, and no interest personal or otherwise

must be allowed to prevent all that such an institution should furnish be- ! ing centred around the one sacred pur- . pose of the whole. The members of the Hospital Board are to bo congra- j tulated on their full realisation ~of the ' weakness of the system, which is Chiefly the result of the controlling body . being about one hundred miles from the institution, and on having taken ! steps to secure to the Taihape hospi- ; tal a greater measure of decisive con- j trol. The installation of a house sur- j geon will establish a state of respon-j sibility that only men specially train- \ ed and naturally adapted for such a : I position can properly understand. The I Board knows that the Taihape hospi- j 1 tal can be made greater use of, that j ; it can furnish health and life-saving j facilities over a much wider field than j it has hitherto been permitted to serve | and they have resolved upon measures ! i for starting the institution on a hugely j more important mission. A resident | medical officer is to De appointed who j is to give his whole, time to the re- j quirement of patients, and there is no | doubt whatever about the result. The j Taihape hospital accommodation will soon be found inadequate for the sick , and maimed seeking admission. Pub- ! lie hospital patients will have even j better professional service than others. | A system whereby the services of the whole medical profession of the town j is available must supply the very Seme of attention it is possible for the town to furnish, and this is exactly as it should be. The district fully warrants a resident medical officer, for the greatest stain on our hospital man- l agement lies in the fact that outside j work leaves the hospital for lengthy periods without- a doctor, and permits the life of a young woman —little more than a girl—of splendid physique, to ebb away, quite unattended, in child birth. It is suicidal to go on assuming that what filled the requirements of the past will be equal to the needs of the future.. Only the stupid will fail to realise that with'the processes of greater production to be set in motion by the._Government the population of the district must increase by leaps and bounds; that the house famine the town'is so severely suffering from must be brought to an end; that from being largely a towla of single men there must ebme "with tho requisite houses an influx of married people with their families; that the heaping up of families and lodgers in insanitary conditions cannot be permitted to continue when the stress of matters arising out of the war has been overcome" In fact, we are concerned that the Government is neglecting a duty I in failing to acquire the huge areas of the highest class land in this district that should be available for soldier settlement at a reasonable price. Government institutions are realising that Taihape longer be set down as a backblocks town; the Public Trust Office has recently decided upon centres of operations in which to J establish permanent branches, and Tai- j hape has been chosen as one of those centres, its district going as far north, j anfi including, Taumarunui. There Is no reason whatever to doubt that eve'n with what the Hospital Board has decided upon with respect to the Taihape hospital it will soon be in a similar position to that in which the Board finds the Wanganui institution —its accommodation too limited for the demands made upon it. Tho manage- | ment of our institutions must be kept j up with the districts-' progress and It is solely on such grounds that we heartily welcome the decision the Hospital Board has come to with regard to hospital management and facilißes in this town and district.