e. Supervision and Reports.
MAURITIUS.
4.
usually include some members of the councils. These boards monopolize all superior functions. They make regulations subject to the Governor's approval, they judge of complaints, they administer the finances, appoint to offices, inspect and report (nominally at least), and finally some of their members, as being also members of the Legislature, approve in council what they have done as commissioners.
In one instance (Castries in St. Lucia) unlimited power is given to the medical officer, and in other cases there are more or less slight variations, but such is the general model.
9. In the matter of inspection and reports, which rise in importance in pro- portion to the badness of the management, there is a great deficiency. Except the discretionary visitations of the Governors, which are not always very frequent, there is seldom any provision for inspection by persons not connected with the institutions. The regulations in some cases provide for the appoint- ment by the boards of visiting committees from their own number; but as they are the only check on themselves, there is no security that they perform their duties, and as a matter of fact in at least two instances even the statutable inspections are confessedly neglected.
Reports or lists of admissions, discharges, and deaths, are sent annually or semi-annually to the Governors, and frequently to the boards, which themselves publish annual statements; but there is nowhere any provision for that kind of reports which is of more value than any others-reports, that is, of the actual working of every part of an institution, made frequently to superior authorities otherwise unconnected with the management.
10. To sum up, of all the twenty-seven establishments, putting aside the new asylum in Jamaica, one only, the Port of Spain hospital in Trinidad, can be said to be in a most satisfactory condition. Throughout all the rest, in a greater or less degree, runs the same complexion of structural and sanitary defectiveness, of insufficient attendance, internal mismanagement, and want of supervision, resulting in the case of the hospitals in an unnecessary waste of life and means, and in the asylums in the substitution in effect of a system of imprisonment for one of cure. Conspicuously the worst are the hospitals and asylums of British Guiana, St. Lucia, and Dominica, which hardly yield, it may be believed, to what those of Jamaica were two years ago, and have not yet wholly ceased to be.
11. No doubt much of what is bad in these West Indian institutions is to be ascribed to the smallness of the islands, and of their populations and revenues. Their poverty suggested the mistaken economy which accepted the first site and building which offered as sufficient for the wants of a limited number of applicants; and to minuteness of scale is chiefly to be traced their general want of system, and their slovenly and ineffective management.
But it is to be feared that much is also, in the case at least of the hospitals, the result of a want of due consideration for the immigrants for whom they were in many instances originally established. Though the first of these causes cannot be obviated, it is time that the second should cease to operate to the discredit and loss of the entire communities.
12. Mauritius.-The expenses of the treatment of lunatics at the lunatic asylum of Mauritius are chargeable to the poor relief funds of the districts in which they are domiciled. The same rule seems to be followed at the hospital.
The sites and buildings of both institutions are small and inconvenient, and better situated and more commodious structures are urgently required. Several of the present wards are too confined, and the existence of sanitary defects, though not otherwise confessed, seems to be indicated by the great prevalence of bowel diseases.
The asylum provides no sufficient employment for the lunatics, and the hospital is without any resident or restricted medical officer, and without any proper system of inspection by superior authorities.
In other respects these two institutions seem to be very well managed, The rapid increase of Indian immigrants necessitates the establishment
of district hospitals for their accommodation.*
It is remarked in Mauritius that the Indians and coloured creoles or ex-apprentices feel a great dread of entering the hospital, and conceal their diseases often till they become incurable.
• See s. 74, p. 28.
Average duration
of treatment
13.-COMPARATIVE TABLE of Hospitals and Asylums in the West Indian Division (with Mauritius).
Name of the Institution.
Size of Site, or Quantity
of Land.
WOLDS (9
Cubic feet of Space per Head.
a. In associated rooms.
6. In single rooms.
See s. 59.
Superficial aros per bead, or interval between beds (not asked for in the case of Asylums).
Average number under treatment at one time; or annual admissions.
Number of Medical
Officers, and whether resident or restricted
in practice.
2 resident and restricted, and 2 visiting.
Number of
Nurses or
Keepers."
00%
14 day, 5 night
147
1 not resident nor restricted
1 to 15 patients
—YDIYRYA
5
Under 700❘
р
Onz
51 square feet
3,144 adminis
83 to 50 square feet
DV
6 acres.
B acros.
953 to 3,600 (?)
-
65 square feet
951 admissions
47 annual admissions I not resident nor restricted
not resident nor restricted (including 3 night)
2 resident and restricted
Samo staff asGeorgetown.Hosp.
1 resident and
12 days.
1 to 16 patients |
34 days.
+
1,280
2 foot interval
600
DWW 10001924 1
39 days.
822
24 feet interval
6 acres.
800 to 450
988 to 433
2%
1 resident 3 not resident nor restricted
6 or 8 mouths (7)
1 to 71 patients
006
008
40 square feet
20
1 not resident nor restricted
-
30 days.
100 to 65 square feet.
1 resident not restricted
21 nores.
No land but the site}
4,00-0
-
1 admission
1 not resident nar restricted
te to
44 square feet
50
For all four, one not resi»
**
and a small yard. |
3 acres.
1,000
10 square
اجدد
200 admissions
10
-
60 square feet
2 not resident nor restricted
-
*
3 feet interval
2 not resident nor restricted "
If acre.
Small gardens.
500 to 350
24 feet interval
478 admissions
I not resident nor restricted,
Less than 640 in
RK
22 colla
60 to 40 square feet
{ "
300
3 or 6
500
60 square foot
IZ
and 1 consulting
I not resident nor restricted
not resident nor restricted
I not resident nor restricted
DE DE DE DE DE
A
313
65 days.
For life.
8 months.
4 to 6 weeks.
2 years.
40 days.
44 days.
--}
7,200
aquare yards in all.
009'1 01 008
100 to 00 square feet
1#pazá ̃begge 01 PUN SID# 11′′
640 to 2,332
327
130
3 not resident nor restricted
22 days.
resident but not restricted | 1 to 131 patients |
8°17 months.
* The numerical Returns cannot always be relied
on
for accuracy. In particular, the value of those which relate to the number of Attendants is often much lessened by the absence of any description of the kinds of persona who are so denominated. Out-door servants, scrubbers, cooks, &c., seem to be sometimes included,
Hospital
Asylum
...
Georgetown Hospital
New Amsterdam Hospital Georgetown Asylum...
BRITISH HONDURAS Anytum
Port of Spain Hospital San Fernando Hospital BARBADOS-
TURK'S ISLANDS
BRITISH GUIANA—
Hospital.
TRINIDAD-
Elospital:
Asylum
Hospital...
ST. VINCENT-
GRENADA
Hospital
Asylum
Castries Poor Asylum
ST. LUCIA-
D
າງ
Immigrant Hospital Lunatic Asylum
Yaws'-house...
Boufrière Hospital..
Vieuxfort Hospital...
Hospital
ANTIGUA-
Asylum
DOMINICA-
14
:
#
***
Lunatic Asylum ... Morna Bruce Poor Asylum Roseau Infirmary...
Hospital MAURITIUS
***
ET} ༑ [ [ I
| PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :-
C.O.885
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC-
COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO