Auckland Provincial Gazette – 1869 – No. 17

Page 272

✨ Medical Reports of Provincial Institutions

Auckland Provincial Government Gazette.

PUBLISHED BY AUTHORITY.

VOL. XVIII.] TUESDAY, APRIL 6, 1869. [No. 17.

Superintendent’s Office,
Auckland, 6th April, 1869.

THE following Annual Medical Reports (for the year 1868), of the several Institutions under the control of the Provincial Government, are published for general information:—

Report of Provincial Hospital.
Report of Provincial Lunatic Asylum.
Report of Mount Eden Gaol.

J. Williamson,
Superintendent.

PROVINCIAL HOSPITAL.

ANNUAL REPORT, 1868.

A further reduction to the extent of 114 is shown in the number of admissions in 1868, compared with that of the preceding year, resulting from increased stringency in the selection of applicants who are, unless in exceptional cases, required to pay the Hospital charges. Those admitted consist of 412 males and 54 females, amounting in all to 466. Of the total treated being 591, sixty-nine (69), comprising 60 males and 9 females, have died, giving a percentage of 11½. This is 3 per cent. greater than in 1867, and is to be accounted for, partly by the removal early in the year of most of the old men from the Hospital to the old Lunatic Asylum, now known as the “Home,”

and partly by the greater severity of the cases admitted, as contrasted with last year. The number remaining at the close amounts to 78, consisting of 61 males and 17 females. The daily average number of patients throughout the year 1868 amounts to 83, and the average number of days each patient has been in Hospital was 51. Like last year, fever cases have been few; and a similar number, (viz. 4), has proved fatal, these call for no special notice. A case of fatal Diarrhoea is recorded, as having occurred in an old man, who had nearly completed his natural term of life. The fatal case of Syphilis occurred in a woman, a considerable portion of whose skull became carious, in consequence of which the subjacent brain was implicated.

The case of Diabetes, which remained from the previous year, terminated fatally by inducing pulmonary consumption, and on examination extensive tubercular disease was found in both lungs. Death was preceded by symptoms of disease of the brain. Four cases of Cancer proved fatal, one was that of a female past the middle period of life, in whom a remarkable degree of obesity existed. The operation (extirpation of the breast) was performed at the urgent desire of the patient, with very little loss of blood. Everything seemed to promise a favourable issue, when rapidly spreading Erysipelas supervened, and

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