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Enclosure 2.
Report from the Medical Officer in charge of Gaol Hospital.
GAOL HOSPITAL, HONGKONG, 1st March, 1892.
SIR,-I have the honour to forward the annual report together with tables of the work done in this Hospital in 1891.
2. During the past year, 364 men were admitted into Hospital, 22 of whom were for observation. In this class are comprised 8 men that were sent by order of the Magistrate for medical certificate as to sanity.
3. The diseases from which these patients were suffering are described in Table K.
4. Tables L and M show the number and percentage of prisoners that were admitted on the first medical examination and the nature of their complaints.
5. The cases that were treated without being received into Hospital, are recorded in Table N. They amounted to 558, including a woman and a man that were put under observation.
6. In an establishment like this, there are frequent occasions for performing minor surgical operations, which I do not think it is of any importance to enumerate here.
7. Abscess of foot, which used to be very common, has sensibly decreased from the time that Major- General GORDON, who was then Superintendent of this Gaol, directed on my recommendation, that the rough surface of the yard in which the prisoners work daily, should be smoothed.
8. Abscess of legs and ankle-joints have almost disappeared, since it has been made the rule for short-sentenced prisoners to wear also, for protection of their skin, canvas girdles under the fetters.・・
9. Two children were born in the Gaol in the months of July and August. The first one was a premature child and survived only a few hours. The mother was in a weak state, and had been imprisoned only seven days before she gave birth. The other child was nursed and thrived well in the Gaol, until his mother completed the term of her sentence.
10. The matron Mrs. M. NOLAN, who acts also as a nurse whenever there is any sick female prisoner, is very attentive to her duties, and by her tact, has been very successful in persuading the women to obey the rules of the Gaol.
11. There have been eight deaths amongst Chinese prisoners, from the following causes: Cerebral embolism (in a debtor), Fatty heart, Catarrahl Pneumonia, General Debility, Meningitis, Emphysema and Cerebral anomia from attempted suicide by hanging, and two cases of perforation of intestines by typhoid fever in its healing stage.
12. All these men, with the exception of the debtor who had no work to do, were excused from hard labour, and those whose sentences did not exceed fourteen days imprisonment were told to pick only a few ounces of oakum instead of one pound and a half, which constitutes the full task according to the regulations. Some of them had been more than once in this Gaol. The one who died of general debility was s0 weak and emaciated with a big ulcer over the sacrum, that Warden FLORES who saw him in the receiving cell shortly after he was sentenced, thought it prudent to remove him into the Hospital.
13. The Magistrate at the request of the friends of the debtor, did not order an autopsy on the body of the deceased. This man had also been in this Hospital two months previously, with paraplegia and articular rheumatism from which attack he completely recovered.
14. The rate of sickness and mortality are given in Table 0. Although two more deaths occurred last year than in the preceding year, the number of admissions into Hospital was four less than in 1890, and there was a considerable diminution of cases that were treated without being detained in Hospital.
There have been eight cases of albuminuria.
The greater proportion of sickness was due to anoemia and general debility, and there has been also an increase of trifling affections, as scabies and tinea circenata.
15. All the physicians are aware that ipecacuanha, which is the best known specific for certain forms of dysentery met with in the tropics and subtropical climates, cannot be swallowed in big doses by every patient, however well prepared it is, without producing some unpleasant effects.
From the observation made at the post mortem examinations on the bodies of those who had succumbed to acute dysentery, I noticed that the lower portion of the large intestines was chiefly affected.
I began in 1890 to prescribe for the dysenteric patients, enema of ipecacuanha to be administered twice daily. To relieve at the same time the tenesmus, a little opium draught was ordered to be taken every eight hours. The experiments made on various patients were most satisfactory. I found that by adopting this method, the cure was more rapid and the patients get the full benefit of the drug, without feeling any of its drawbacks.