Letter to the managers of the Glasgow Royal Infirmary on certain proposed alterations on the medical organization of the Institution ... February, 1870.

  • Fleming, John Gibson
Date:
1870
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Letter to the managers of the Glasgow Royal Infirmary on certain proposed alterations on the medical organization of the Institution ... February, 1870. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    necessitates a large number of preliminary arrange- ments. Many appliances required during the night, but not during the day, have to be removed; the refuse must be cleared away; the wards swept and made orderly; besides, the patients must have breakfasted, and the breakfast utensils and debris removed, before the arrival of the medical attendants and students. The carrying out of these indispensable operations will require at least an hour and a-half, more likely two hours, before the visit. Now, it is well known that many patients who pass the fore-part of the night in feverish restlessness are often able to enjoy a tranquil morning's sleep, the soothing influence of which on their maladies must be most beneficial. Of this comfort, this natural medicament, they must be robbed by the bustle and noise necessarily going on in the wards from a very early hour, from the causes just men- tioned. Again, in our northern climate, and especially perhaps in our own city, the mornings for several months during the winter session are cold, dark, and gloomy; the visit must be made with artificial light—a dis- advantage in examining any patient, and particularly in performing most surgical operations. To any of the medical attendants and to students who are not in the enjoyment of robust health, or who may be suffering from any of those maladies so incident to our climate, which, though not of a serious character, yet require some atten- tion, rest, and avoidance of exposure to inclement weather, attendance at the morning hour must be extremely trying and hurtful. I understand from the officials that the afternoon hour would be equally convenient, per- haps more so, for the domestic arrangements of the establishment. Another argument for the afternoon visit, to which I attach great weight, is, that it would enable medical men from the country, many of whom have paid for the hie privilege of attending the Hospital, to visit it from time to time, to see and hear of the im- provements in the treatment of disease and in the progress of science, and to converse with the medical attendants regarding patients they have sent to the Innrmary, and in whose cases they are deeply in-
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