2
40
of a fairly senior officer, with some junior assistants, open 24 hours of the day, where all patients coming to the Hospital first report. Briefly, such patients might:-
(a)
receive immediate treatment for a minor ailment and return home
(b) be given a card for attendance on a certain day at the appropriate out-patient clinic (Medical, Surgical, Gynaecological or other Special Clinic) (c) be admitted immediately as an emergency case
to the appropriate department, after due consulta- tion with an officer of the department concerned.
A schedule of Out-Patient Clinics, embracing all the main departments, would be drawn up, and there would be a reasonable assurance that patients attending these clinics would be correctly allocated if they had already passed through a brief preliminary investigation in the Receiving Room.
WARDS
It would be necessary to allocate all the Wards to the main Departments, and certain Special Departments, on an agreed percentage basis for both male and female cases. For such a scheme to function smoothly, it would be necess- ary for the whole Hospital, with the maximum number of beds available (say 300) to be treated as one indivisible whole working under a unified control.
ADDITIONAL EQUIPMENT, ETC.
In order to bring the status of the Hospital into line with that required of a Teaching Hospital, a great deal of actual additional equipment and of improvement of exist- ing facilities would benecessary. This would include
addition of development of the Operating Theatre (with the perhaps two theatres), fitting up a modern Delivery Room, as well as making numerous additions to the equipment needed for diagnosis and treatment. Probably a good deal of replacement would be required of hospital beds, beside furnishings and equipment. An X-ray Plant, an adequate Clinical and Pathological Laboratory, facilities for Post- mortem Examinations, a Record Room, Lecture Rooms, for students and nurses and adequate accommodation for Nurses, Students and Staff (including subsidiary staff) would all be needed, and would have to receive the attention of a Special Planning Committee.
The following building plans would make provision for the changes envisaged:-
The addition of a further storey to the whole hospital building in order to provide a lecture room and quarters for the Medical staff and Interns. This would release space in the present hospital building now occupied by medical officers.
The building of adequate quarters to house the male and female servants of the Hospital who at present live in the basement. This would release the whole of the basement for Qut-patient use and other purposes.
The building of the long projected Nurses Home (for which plans were drawn up before the war by the Tung Wah authorities). This would release a greater part of the present top floor of the hospital, now occupied by nurses, for the use of hospital patients.