See Appen-
dix IV, pago LV.
( 14 )
Do you know whether the patients themselves wanted to go out, or the doctors discharged them ?--I found they had been discharged. I inquired and found they had gone. I do not know why. I suppose because the patients or their relatives wished them to be discharged.
In a European hospital suppose a patient wants to leave, say, to go to a better climate, would you allow him to go?-If suffering from infectious disease?
I am not talking of cases of infectious disease. I am talking of cases where the patients are not fully recovered.-You cannot detain them against their will, but you can out that it will be better for them to remain.
you can point
Of course, I know no European doctor would allow an infectious case to go out because he is responsible for it, but in the case where a man is not fully recovered and wants to go somewhere else, or to go under another doctor, he is quite at liberty to go.
THE PRESIDENT-There is another point in your reports-the refusal to admit patients. You reported two cases in which the Tung Wa Hospital refused to take in patients, and it was found on inquiry that the doctors regarded the cases as incurable, and under the regulations they thought they were authorised to refuse to admit incurables?-One of these cases came into the Civil Hospital voluntarily, and he has since recovered, it was therefore not incurable. They refused to admit the man because the leg was rotten, and, as they said, incurable.
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THE PRESIDENT-Was this patient's foot amputated ?—Partially; some dead bones were taken out.
So far as the Hospital was concerned it was incurable except by amputation, and they do not amputate in the Tùng Wa Hospital.
I remember with regard to this that an attempt was being made to discover where sick people came from, and instructions were given to the Tung Wa Directors that they were not to admit patients without getting their addresses.-I think that referred to plague cases only. It was not to apply to other cases. It was because of their refusal to admit sick people that I inquired if they had power to refuse admission. One of the cases would not have been admitted had it not been for Police Constable MACKENZIE, who was on duty at the Hospital at the time.
THE PRESIDENT-I think it is only fair to the Directors to state that they had instructions that they must get the addresses of everybody who came to the Hospital. That order was given at the time of the plague, and some misunderstanding seems to have arisen with regard to it.
Mr. WHITEHEAD-By whom was it issued? By the Police?
THE PRESIDENT-At the instance of the Medical Department, I think, in order to trace cases of plague.
Mr. WHITEHEAD-Was it issued by the Government to the Tung Wa Hospital to get particulars before admission ?
THE PRESIDENT-Yes.
Mr. WHITEHEAD-Have destitute Chinese the right to claim admission into the Tung Wa Hospital ?—That is the point I wish to have made quite clear. The Hospital was established for the treatment of the indigent sick of the Chinese community, and it is said that a great number of cases have been refused admission ?-These two are the only cases I know of personally, but I believe many others have occurred, because a European constable was not always on duty there.
THE PRESIDENT-The Hospital is now visited by the Justices of the Peace in the same way as other hospitals, the Gaol, and other public institutions?—Yes.