Medical notes on climate, diseases, hospitals, and medical schools, in France, Italy, and Switzerland : comprising an inquiry into the effects of a residence in the south of Europe, in cases of pulmonary consumption, and illustrating the present state of medicine in those countries / by James Clark, M.D.

  • Clark, James, Sir, 1788-1870.
Date:
1820
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Medical notes on climate, diseases, hospitals, and medical schools, in France, Italy, and Switzerland : comprising an inquiry into the effects of a residence in the south of Europe, in cases of pulmonary consumption, and illustrating the present state of medicine in those countries / by James Clark, M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

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    Such is the dreadful state of this house, whieh contains one hundred and eighty males and ninety-seven females, of whom one third, the keeper told me, were kept constantly chained. From the same source 1 learned that the annual number of deaths (and this 1 appre- hend is the principal way in which this house gets rid of its inhabitants ;) sometimes amounted to eighty, (nearly one third of the whole); that they had been as few as thirty; and that the average was fifiy, (nearly one fifth)-—a mortality I believe unequalled in any institution of the kind in any country: The only good thing I observed about this establishment was a piece of ground which had just been enclosed for the exercise of those whose chains were permitted to be undone. Such is the state of the institutions at Turin for the refuge and relief of afflicted humanity. St. John's, though by far ihe best regulated, and in the best order, aiibrds ample room for improvement. The ])lan of admitting pensioners in a general hospital, is, I conceive, essentially a bad one, were it only as interfering with that regular system of order and uniformity which ought to be kept up in such an establishment. This hospital might also be cleaner and better ventilated. Of'La Carita'the plan is radically