Report of the Committee of Visitors, and eighteenth annual report of the medical superintendent, of the asylum for the insane poor of the County of Wilts / Wiltshire County Lunatic Asylum.

  • Wiltshire County Asylum.
Date:
1869
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Report of the Committee of Visitors, and eighteenth annual report of the medical superintendent, of the asylum for the insane poor of the County of Wilts / Wiltshire County Lunatic Asylum. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    disease has prevailed amongst them. It was observed that during and after the almost unprecedented heat of the summer, there was less diarrhoea in this Establishment than in ordinary seasons. The deaths, 45 in number (18 of men and 27 of women), are below the average; and give a mean mortality for the year of 10.5 per cent. One unusual feature is that of the mortality for the two sexes being very nearly equal, and indeed higher for the women than the men ; whereas usually there is a pre¬ ponderance of mortality of 50 per cent, on the side of the men. The mean annual mortality for the 17.35 years, since the opening of the Asylum, has been at the rate of 11.8 per cent. MEAN ANNUAL MORTALITY. MALES. FEMALES. BOTH SEXES. For the year 1868 . . . 10.2 10.8 10.5 For 17.35 years-1851-68* 15. 9.4 11.8 A remarkable circumstance is the very large proportion of deaths among the aged. As many as 16, or one-third of the whole number, had completed the term of “ three score and ten yearsten of these being more than seventy-five, and three eighty, years of age and upwards. As usual, the diseases proving fatal consisted in a large proportion‘—first, of those of the brain and nervous system ; and secondly, of those of the lungs and heart. The cases not to be classed under the one or the other of these heads are, as Table 18 will shew, a mere fraction of the whole. One death from an accidental cause was the subject of investigation by a Coroner’s jury. This * Viz., from the opening of the Asylum, Sept. 19th, 1851, to the end of the year 1868. Deaths and rate of Mortality. Causes of Death. Inquests.