Annual report of the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital : 1918.

  • Peter Bent Brigham Hospital.
Date:
1918
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Annual report of the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital : 1918. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    58/184 (page 50)
    trasting with 4530 and 26,032, respectively, in 1917. It thus appears that there was a definite diminution in the number of patients treated, both in the house and in the Out-Door Department, for which several explanations can be offered. Thus, during the influenza epidemic, which raged throughout the autumn and early winter months, the surgical work was cut down to a minimum. No cases were admitted except serious emergencies. The major portion of the surgical wards was turned over to the medical service, to accommodate their influenza cases or the overflow of ordinary medical patients. About half of the surgical house officers were loaned for the care of influenza patients, and, with incidental sickness among the remaining ones, the effective surgical staff was re¬ duced to the lowest possible point. Those remaining would gladly have offered their services to help combat this dreadful scourge, had such a course not rendered them unavailable for the care of surgical emergencies. Moreover, as regards the lessened resort by patients to the Out-Door Department, it is to be suspected that the decreased efficiency and experience of the sub-senior house officers in charge led to less satisfactory work, and consequently less confidence on the part of the public, although the members of the resident and visiting staffs supplemented this work so far as possible. It is to be noted that a similar tendency to diminished patronage existed in all other departments of the hospital. The medical services have shown an even greater proportion¬ ate diminution of attendance. The teaching of surgery to the students of the Harvard Medical School was carried on without curtailment of exercises, though doubtless with diminished efficiency, during the year, and the members of the Visiting Staff who were condemned to carry on the duties of civil life, rather than enter the army, could find consolation in the fact that they contributed to the education of many