Twenty-first annual report of the Suffolk Lunatic Asylum : December, 1858.

  • Suffolk Lunatic Asylum
Date:
[1859]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Twenty-first annual report of the Suffolk Lunatic Asylum : December, 1858. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    11/36 page 11
    (Cmtuniaiotira' Htpnrt. Sutpolk County Asylum, 29th. November, 1858. Since our last visit in July, 1857, 148 patients have been admitted, 93 have been discharged, and 45 have died. There are now in the Asylum 294 patients, of whom 130 are males and 164 females. We have this clay examined all the inmates, and gone over every part of the Asylum. We found very little excitement among the patients, and the women were much less noisy and excited than on the occasion of our last inspection. We find but few patients are registered as being under medical treatment for bodily illness. The names of six men and eight women appear in last week’s report, but their bodily disorder is not stated, as required by the acts. We beg to call attention to the fact that the medical journal is not in the form of the schedule. One woman was in seclusion ns we went into the wards, but she was let out while we were there.* There was no mechanical restraint, which indeed is never resorted to in this Asylum. The clothing we found good, and the bedding abundant and of good quality There is nothing now to report in reference to the occupation and amuse¬ ments of the patients. The women appeared to employ themselves in various ways, but there seems to be a scarcity of employment for the men: and we think that if proper shops and tools were provided, a larger number of them might be advantageously and usefully occupied in tailoring, shoe-making, mat¬ making, the manufacture of cocoa-nut fibre matting, &c. We notice, with pleasure, that various improvements have been effected since we were here; and that some of our recommendations have been earned out. All the circular windows on the female side, and several on the male side, have been removed. A portion of the single rooms has been boarded, and some of the boundary walls lowered. * It may hardly be worth notice, but as an erroneous impression is con¬ veyed by this clause, we trust the writer will be glad to see it corrected as the hasty dash of his pen: the patient was placed in her room, for disturbing him as he was writing, and let out again as he stood by. The seclusion was for three or four minutes at the longest, and adopted, not removed, in consequence of this visit.
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