WANGANUI HOSPITAL

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 83, Issue 40, 17 February 1939, Page 6

WANGANUI HOSPITAL

HEALTH DIRECTOR’S SUGGESTIONS COMMITTEE’S REPLIES Recommendations framed to improve the administration of the Wanganui Hospital were contained in a letter from the Director-General of Health, Dr. R. A. Shore, and dealt with in a report of the House Committee laid before a meeting of the Hospital Board yesterday:— The recommendation’s in Dr. Shore's letter were:—(1) Additional nursing staff. (2) Improvements needed in nursing technique in the Children’s Ward and also the sterilisation of nurses’ overalls in the tuberculosis ward. (3) The necessity for reconstruction of sanitary annexes <•! the sterilising rooms of various wards. (4) Need for protection over bulbs for radiant heat cradles. (5) Immediate attention to be given to laundry working conditions. The House Committee’s report, which answered each clause in Dr. Shore’s letter separately, expressed regret that the report supplied to Dr. Shore should have included reference to nursing technique in the Children's Ward, as that was being attended to at the time the inspection was made. Nor did the committee think that there was any need to mention the sterilisation of capes in the tuberculosis ward as it had been explained to the inspector at the time of his inspection what the fault was and that the mistake could not occur again. Protection of radiant heat bulbs was being provided and there was really no need to mention them and they were being attended to at the time. The House Committee's report also stated that everything possible was being done to make staff conditions as congenial as possible. Dealing with the matter of work in the laundry, the committee recommended that the managing secretary (Mr. L. V. Kerby), the medical superintendent (Dr. 11. L. Widdowson). the head laundryman and the matron should discuss the matter of laundry conditions with the board's architect and then submit, through the board, to the Department of Health, pro: posals for alterations which, when done, would serve the present and future hospital for many years.