THE QUEEN MARY HOSPITAL
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NEW CASUALTY WARD BUILDING
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目
KI
Perspective drawing of the new building.
missions and
Work has just begun on the con- facilities undreamed of when they the year, of a penicillin preparation struction of a new Casualty Ward were planned; before long it will be which required only a single daily and Housemen's Quarters at Queen essential to add further operating injection instead of two. The out- Mary Hospital. The accommodation theatres to ease the situation.
patient department continued to be in the hospital is inadequate in several ways and this new wing will
Shortage of beds in Government theless overcrowding was as great as conducted daily in two shifts. Never- lead to greater efficiency and to les- hospitals is a continual cause for ever: long queues were invariable sening of pressure on the existing concern, and substantial waiting lists and often medical officers had to Facilities: it will at the same time are always maintained. Hospital ad- work two to a consulting room. provide a better casualty reception
clinic attendances in department and more comfortable Hong Kong have generally shown an Overcrowding is common not only quarters for the house officers. The annual increase and accommodation in the general hospitals, but also in present quarters at Queen Mary Hos- in practically all cases was found to the maternity homes and in the pital are inadequate to accommodate be insufficient. The number of beds mental hospital. As the Director of the extra number of persons obliged for the treatment of tuberculosis is Medical and Health Services. Dr. the to work as house officers as the far below requirements and out Hon. K.C. Yeo, pointed out in his result of the amendment of the patient treatment has had to be annual report, in Tsan Yuk Hospital, Medical Registration Ordinance, resorted to on as large a basis as for example the main centre for which makes it obligatory for a possible.
the training of midwives
the aver- medical student to serve satisfactori-
age length of stay of patients was ly for a period of one year as a house
three to four days. officer before being fully registered as a medical practitioner.
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The nominal bed strength of the infectious disease
disease hospital at Sai Ying Pun is 88. but temporary beds Overcrowding in the Mental Hos- have to be provided at periods of pital has been a serious problem for The Queen Mary is the most im- peak incidence of the more common several years and the situation dete- portant hospital of its kind in the infectious diseases. The hospital riorated last year. It should accom- Colony. During recent years, several building is very old and outmoded modate 140 patients, but at the end additions and alterations have been and remains unsatisfactory although of the year there were 309 and the made. the latest being the new extensive repairs and redecoration problems that faced the staff were multi-storey building for nursing were carried out. All the infectious staff; this is now nearing completion sections of the Colony's hospitals and will provide accommodation for were under serious pressure in mid- 45 nursing sisters and allow of a summer of 1953 on account of the larger intake of trainee nurses and typhoid epidemic, and arrangements a more adequate training school. had to be made for surplus cases to However. there are still serious be taken by the Kwong Wah Hospital. deficiencies in the Hospital's facili-
grave indeed.
The new Mental Hospital being built in the New Territories, some 20 miles from the city, will provide for 500 patients, and it may soon be pos- sible to transfer some of the chronic cases from the present hospital. and thus relieve the overcrowding.
ties, not the least important of At the Kowloon Hospital last year. which is in the operating theatre in-patients at 8.104 were 400 below
The situation in the Government suites. The majority of cases treated the previous figure and out-patients
greatly improved in the surgery department to-day also decreased by about 33,000 to hospitals will be are suffering from acute conditions 601.192. The decrease, however, was with the completion of the new Men- with a resultant pressure on the mainly caused by the use, for half tal Hospital, the 200-bed Tsan Yuk
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