Hospital congestion

IT can excite no surprise in the mind of the public to learn that there is a serious lack of accommodation in the Dunedin Hospital for military cases. Members of the Expeditionary Force are being brought back to the dominion in large numbers and each returning draft just now consists for the most part of men who were under hospital treatment when they left Great Britain and who still require hospital treatment.

Three or four transports with drafts of cases of this description arrived last week and it is probable

that several others are now on their way. An effect of this, that was only to be expected, is apparent in the congestion which is now reported in the Dunedin Hospital. General hospitals, built to meet the normal requirements of a community, cannot possibly cope efficiently with the demand that is created by the need for the treatment of hundreds of military cases, of which a not inconsiderable proportion require the close attention that can be given only to patients resident in the institutions.

The provision of special military wards serves but inadequately to meet the situation. The proof of this is afforded in the fact that it has become necessary in the Dunedin Hospital to discharge from the institution for treatment as outpatients a number of cases that should in reality be retained in the wards. The less serious cases have simply to make way for the more serious.