No_4_1955 — Page 8

waka enumnumo. (tuneen kara)

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Plan of the site showing arrangements of hospital buildings.

each year. (In 1954 the number was 1656 -one-third of them new cases). Many out-patients should really have been ad- mitted if beds had been available.

Some of the statistics from other coun- tries are revealing, and it is to be hoped that in Hong Kong we may never have the problem of mental disease increasing to such dimensions. It has been estimat- ed that I person in zo in the

United States will spend part of his life in EL mental hospital; and in Great Britain in 35 will be certified insane some time or other in his life-time. In England and Wales 6 per 1000 persons are in mental hospitals ог mental defective colonies. Both in Great Britain and the U.S. half of all hospital beds are occupied by mental patients. This is the situation the authorities have to face in other coun- tries, and although for various reasons what we have here is not so disturbing, there is no doubt that the problem of mental ill-health is far more serious than most people think.

Ignorance (and prejudice) is not соп- fined to the public, but curiously enough, it is found in the medical profession too. There is on the whole, little knowledge of what a modern mental hospital is like, It is not a gaol but a therapeutic munity. That is why it should be close to the town so that constant contact can

Con-

In this connection, we quote the follow- Roughly 9 out of to cases admitted in a ing extract from the Annual Report

of year are

discharged and of these cases the Scottish Board of Control for 1954 cn more than 2 out of 3 are fully recovered the question of the treatment of mental although a small number of these fully re- illness:

covered cases may later relapse as in "The public are increasingly aware that other kinds of illness. But it will be be kept with patients' relatives and the modern methods of treatment, such as seen that the number of admissions is in- staff not isolated from other doctors and electrotherapy, insulin therapy, and leu- creasing yearly, and there will always be nurses. Psychiatry cannot be practised cotomy, offer in many cases increased those who cannot be cured. These cases, without the doctor keeping in close touch prospects of early recovery or of ame- unlike those uncured in general hospitals, with relatives, right from the admission lioration of symptoms.”

do not as a rule die of their illness, and and diagnosis of the patient to his period Among the ameliorative measures now most of them have to remain for the rest of trial after recovery, and following that, being used, the report mentions an in- of their lives in the Hospital. This is his ultimate discharge. crease in the facilities for physical training why the problem of mental illness is so and the recreational therapy. and the distressing for every country. The plan for value of the open-door system "which the eventual expansion of the new Cas- has contributed greatly to the reduction tle Peak Hospital from 500 to 1000 beds in many cases of aggressive behaviour and has done much to reduce the stigma at- tached in the past to mental illness'.

It is in order to continue and enlarge upon the

work already begun in Hong Kong that the construction of the new Mental Hospital is being so urgently pressed.

One very important reason why we have been lagging behind in the development of mental hospitals is lack of public un- derstanding concerning the size of the problem we have to cope with.

The following figures will help to give an idea of the needs that have to be met in our present Mental Hospital

commodation for 140 beds:

Ist admissions

Re-admissions

with ac-

1953 1954

599

749 226 274

Remaining in

from pre-

vious year

Total

260

309

Discharged

Died

1085

1332

742 914

34

55

Remaining at the end of

the year

Total

309 363 1085 1332

is therefore rational and far-sighted.

In this respect the distance of the new

from town is a Hospital

disadvantage. although the topography of Hong Kong,

has made a more suitable site difficult to find. It is important that the community Apart from in-patients at present well should know about its Mental Hospital over a food cases are seen as out-patients and take an interest in its work.

立

Architect's sketch of the first of the residential buildings to be built.

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