Second report from the Select Committee of the House of Lords on Metropolitan Hospitals, &c. : together with the Proceedings of the Committee, minutes of evidence, and appendix / Ordered, by the House of Commons, to be printed, 5 August 1891.

  • House of Lords
Date:
1891
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Second report from the Select Committee of the House of Lords on Metropolitan Hospitals, &c. : together with the Proceedings of the Committee, minutes of evidence, and appendix / Ordered, by the House of Commons, to be printed, 5 August 1891. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

    29/956 (page 11)
    26 January 1891.] Mr. Lushington. [ Continued. Lord Zuuche of Haryngworth—continued. was the income from your estates sufficient?— We never asked the public for a sixpence. 9957. All your difficulties then commenced ?— All our difficulties commenced then. 9958. I think you said that your present dis- posable net income was about 26,000 1. a year ?— Yes, from our estates. 9959. I think the public subscribed 100,000 l. a short time ago?—Yes. 9960. Are you obliged to take from the capital of that sum to supplement the income from time to time ?—Yes, we have to do so. 9961. So that in course of time that will Be exhausted?—Yes, but we did it with our eye3 open ; we felt that posterity must put their hands in their pockets in their turn, and do something for the hospital. We thought that better than reducing our expenditure, where a hospital was so very much needed, to our absolute income. Lord T/iring. 9962. I understand, with, respect to the management of the hospital, you would not yourself at all object if the governors took a little more active part in it, and appointed a weekly committee to help you ?—I always find that I can get any assistance from the governors. I think they are always ready to help me. 9963. You do not think it is necessary for them to take a more active part?—I do not think so ; I do not think the business would be done any better. 9964. With respect to this half hour that the nurses are supposed to have for dinner, do not you think that, coute que coute, some arrange- ment ought to be made by which they should have at least a clear half hour for dinner; could not the doctors give way if necessary ; surely the health of the nurses is quite as important as the convenience of the doctors?—I have not heard our nurses complain that they find the time short; that is my only standard. As a general rule, I should say that half an hour or twenty minutes is too little time for dinner ; but I have no complaints on the subject. 9965. I am aware that there are no complaints, and I am aware that it is not your fault that there is this short time, but you really do not think it is enough?—When it is cut down to less than one half hour I fear it is too short a time. 9966. And you think, therefore, that a little sacrifice ought to be made to secure a full half hour ?—Yes. 9967. With regard to those who die in the hospital, what happens ?—When a death takes place in one of the wards two attendants come up with the shell, and a pall is thrown over the coffin, and then the body is placed in it, and the nurses and the sister walk reverently behind the coffin to the door of the ward. It is then taken and put into the mortuary. When any friend of the deceased wishes to see the body he comes up to the ward where his friend died, and says, “ I wish to see the body of So-and-so who died on such and such a day.” The nurse then goes down to the dead-house, speaks to the man in charge there, has the body taken out of the dead- house, put into a little mortuary entirely separate in a shell that is kept for the purpose, sees that Lord Ttiring—continued, the corpse is decently and properly arranged, and then when all that is complete she takes the friend of the deceased into that mortuary. 9968. With respect to the opening of a body, supposing the patient dies of a particular disease, and the doctor wishes to open the body, who has the control over that ?—The doctor manages that, but it his duty in the post mortem department to see that everything is decently and properly covered up afterwards. 9969. But nobody except the doctor looks to see whether the body is, say, properly sewn up so that it shall not unnecessarily offend the friends? —The nurse sees that everything in the shell is in decent order; that grave clothes are arranged so that the friends see nothing of course but the face of the deceased. 9970. And care is taken not to offend them ?— Every care is taken not to offend them. Earl of Arran. 9971. Have you ever turned your mind, by chance, seeing the large size of your estates, and the amount of land that you unfortunately have had on hand for some time, to the question whether it would be possible to supply the needs of the hospital from those estates yourselves instead of by contract; for instance, whether you could grow your own meat and vegetables, and things of that sort ?—I am glad to have the op- portunity of answering that question, because of late we have made arrangements for the supply of our milk from our own estates. All the milk that is consumed in the hospital comes from our own estates; it costs us a little more money, but we are sure that it is perfectly good and pure; and I think it has been a very great additional comfort to the patients in the hospital to have had such good milk. I have now got under consideration whether we could furnish our poultry from our estates, but I have not yet turned my attention to vegetables. It is a very difficult thing to arrange for our poultry, because I cannot say how many fowls will be wanted for the next day ; it depends upon what the doctor orders; if he says there are to be so many patients on chicken diet next day, we have got to get the chickens ready. But as regards milk, we have nearly a fixed supply every day. 9972. The question of supplying meat from your own estates you have not turned your at- tention to ?—Meat I have not; there would be a similar difficulty about that. Lord Thring. 9973. The sister is the superintendent of the ward ?—The superintendent of the ward, the head nursing authority in the ward. 9974. Is she a lady ?—She is a lady ; and that has been of great advantage in the new system, I think. 9975. She has a permanent appointment?— She has a permanent appointment. 9976. And I suppose that the removal of her would, in fact, rest with yourself?—Yes. 9977. The matron is the head sister ? —Yes. 9978. And, supposing anything were wrong, a sister would be removed, on the recommendation of the matron, by yourself?—Yes.