Ninth annual report of the county and city of Worcester Pauper Lunatic Asylum.

  • Worcester Pauper Lunatic Asylum
Date:
1862
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Ninth annual report of the county and city of Worcester Pauper Lunatic Asylum. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    covering of the walls with creepers wherever possible, the substitution of thatch for slate in the roofs of the verandahs in the two front airing courts, and the erection of summer houses in the back courts. “ In addition to the foregoing, we have made some minor suggestions, to which Dr. Sherlock has promised his attention. “The medical journals and statutory records are all very carefully kept, and the state of the Asylum generally, is most creditable to the Medical Superintendent, and to the several officers in both divisions who act under his directions. “ JOHN FORSTER, 7 Commissioners in “ S. GASKELL, i hunctcy.” The case of the Patient alluded to by the Commissioners as being possessed of j£200 a-year is no uncommon one. Patients are sent as paupers who are not so in fact, under arrangements between their friends and officers of Boards of Guardians or Parish Officers, by which the parishes get reimbursed the weekly charges made at the Asylum; and lunatics wandering at large, or not under proper care or control, are sometimes sent to the Asylum, (though possessed of considerable property,) at the same rate of pay as pauper lunatics. In the particular case remarked upon by the Commissioners, the Patient was sent as a Pauper; we are glad to say she was discharged from the Asylum perfectly cured shortly after the Commissioners* visit. Finding that in the wards of the Asylum appropriated to male Patients there were 23 vacant beds, and that frequent applications were made for the admission of private Patients, we determined, after much consideration, to authorise the reception of ten private male Patients, at the rate of 15s. a week for their lodging, food, clothing, and medical attendance, under certain defined regulations, such Patients to be residents of the county or city. Only four admissions have taken place, and those are included in the numbers above given. In our Eighth Annual Report, we drew the attention of the Court and Council to the pressing necessity for large additional accommodation for female Patients, for new Store Rooms, and the enlargement of the Recreation Hall, and stated that a large
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