King's College Hospital : report for 1842 / with remarks.

  • William Augustus Guy
Date:
[1843]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: King's College Hospital : report for 1842 / with remarks. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    The report for the year 1842 is, in more than one respect, more complete than that of the two former years. The registration of the in-patients, com¬ menced in the present year, embraces more than two-thirds of the entire number, so that the report more nearly represents the prevalent diseases of the district in which the hospital is situate. The number of cases analysed also ex¬ ceeds, by more than 2,000, that of the year 1841. As the number of cases is so considerable, it has been thought advisable to distinguish the periods at which the several diseases have oc¬ curred; accordingly, a table is added, in which this distinction is made in re¬ spect to the larger groups of disease. Another table is given, illustrating the influence of sex on disease. Similar tables for each year, and for the sum of the preceding years, will be given in each future report. The total number of patients regis¬ tered on the books of the hospital, for the year 1842, is as follows :— In-patients.1383 Out-patients.11138 Total. . 12521 This number, which is exclusive of casualties, comprises 180 midwifery cases*. Of the 1383 in-patients 93 died, being as nearly as possible 1 in 15, or 6*72 per cent, which, considering the high proportion that the number of patients bears to the size of the hospital, and the number of urgent cases admitted, is a very low mortality. Some slight alterations have been made in the arrangement of the first table, and in the general abstract. In the reports of 1840 and 1841 pleurodynia was classed with rheumatic affections, inasmuch as it has its seat in the muscular fibre. But as the pain in the left side, which is so common an ac¬ companiment of the functional dis¬ orders of the female, though it has its * Themidwifery department is of comparatively recent establishment, which accounts for the com¬ parative smallness of the number. seat in the muscles, is obviously neu¬ ralgic, it has been transferred to the group of neuralgic affections; whilst the cases of pleurodynia occurring in the male being merely a form of local muscular rheumatism, have been placed under that head. The cases of hooping- cough, too, which, in the former reports, were placed among the epidemic dis¬ eases, have been grouped, in the present report, with diseases of the chest, and delirium tremens with mental disorders. With these exceptions, the alterations in the first table are not such as to require comment. In the general abstract, catarrh and intestinal worms have been madeseparate headings,instead of being merged, the one in febrile affections, and the other in diseases of the in¬ testines. These alterations will be carefully attended to when any use is made of the reports of the years 1840 and 1841. Analysis of 10,438 Registered Cases of Dis¬ ease, treated at King's College Hospital, during the year 1842. Male. Fem. Tot. Febris continua 17 7 24 -intermittens . 3 4 7 -ephemera 3 2 5 -dentitionis 0 7 13 ■-infantum remittens . 136 159 295 Catarrhus 137 248 385 Variola .... 6 2 8 Varicella 14 5 19 Rubeola 10 14 24 -sequelae 2 0 2 Scarlatina 14 16 30 •-sequelae . 3 1 4 Erysipelas 15 19 34 Struma .... 73 61 134 Cachexia 3 4 7 Mollifies ossium 10 5 15 Debilitas 46 158 204 Purpura 2 1 3 Plethora 3 3 6 Podagra 31 9 40 Anasarca 4 10 14 Ascites .... 4 2 6 QCdema.... 7 14 21 Muscular Rheumatism 252 188 440