Pennsylvania Hospital

“ Bond from the nature of his practice daily realized the comfort and aid which a well equipped hospital would furnish to many of his patients. It is an assured fact that he constantly talked to his friends and patients about the foundation of a hospital for the care of sick and injured to say nothing of the care of the insane. During the first years of the Pennsylvania Hospital a considerable proportion of its work consisted in the care of the so-called lunatics. ”

“ The instruction in the Pennsylvania Hospital having now been fully organized, with regular lectures delivered throughout the year by the physicians and surgeons in attendance, and a similar system introduced into the Philadelphia Hospital, the office of Clinical Professor to the University has been abolished. Students have now the advantages afforded in the way of instruction by both these Institutions, which have occupied so important a position in connection with medical teaching; and also those afforded by the clinics in the University building. ”

“ The Western Pennsylvania Hospital in Pittsburg was used by the Government for a military hospital at this time, principally for Pennsylvania soldiers. Such men as were able to bear the fatigue of transportation from Washington or other places were sent to this institution in order to make room at the Stanton for cases direct from the field of battle. The Sisters of Mercy were invited to give their services, a request with which they cheerfully complied, early in 1863. In this institution the Sisters experienced the same courtesy from the officers 250 as was extended to them elsewhere. ”

“ If there were nothing else to look at but the single institution known as the Pennsylvania Hospital for the Insane, with all its wonderful agencies and appointments for ministering to the relief of the direst of all the ills that flesh is heir to, we should exclaim with gratitude to the Author of all good—How marvellous the change! ”

“ In April of the same year he was appointed resident physician to the Friends' Asylum for the Insane at Frankford, Philadelphia, and in March, 1833, he was elected resident physician to the Pennsylvania Hospital, where he remained two years and had charge of the "west wing" devoted to the treatment of the insane. He left the hospital in 1835 and settled in Philadelphia in the general practice of medicine, in which he was highly successful, obtaining a recognized reputation in the treatment of insanity. ”

“ They are designed for the accommodation of 200 patients, and in their general structure and arrangement accord with those of the Pennsylvania Hospital already noticed. The asylum occupies a most eligible site, about two miles north-west of the public buildings, surrounded by a choice farm of 111 acres, with an unfailing supply of fine soft water, and a beautiful grove in the rear, thus affording abundant room for hospital purposes, and embracing every variety of scenery and spacious pleasure grounds for the use of the patients. ”

“ The hospital is often used by Medicaid recipients living in southwestern Pennsylvania. In January 1986, Pennsylvania's Department of Public Welfare notified WVUH of new Medicaid reimbursement schedules for services provided to Pennsylvania residents by the Morgantown hospital. ”

“ But why—when authority is given, why not provide a Hospital for those struck with the pestilence of drunkenness and the accumulated miseries that come in its train? Is there a disease in the whole catalogue of human suffering that is more epidemic, if not contagious, than intoxication? ”

“ Some salutary cautions are given respecting the removal of distant patients to the hospital, especially in sudden and acute cases of insanity, and where they are in a weak or diseased state, and exposed to much suffering and fatigue on the journey. The opinion of a judicious physician should be taken before the attempt to remove them is made. ”

“ Of 420 insane persons in the State, only 180 are enjoying the advantages of Hospital treatment.
Charitable Institutions in Indiana.—Hospital for the Insane.—This institution has 140 patients under treatment, and yet there are in the State 300 insane persons (exclusive of idiots) who are totally unprovided for. Applications are rejected for want of room, and an immediate enlargement of the buildings is contemplated. It is stated that there are in Indiana 442 insane, and 617 idiotic persons. Of the 292 patients who have been treated in the hospital, only 78 were natives of Indiana. ”

“ Children's Hospital. Church Dispensary of Southwark. Episcopal Hospital. German Hospital. Germantown Dispensary and Hospital. Howard Hospital and Infirmary for Incurables. Jefferson Medical College Hospital. Jewish Hospital. Medico-Chirurgical Hospital. Northern Dispensary of Philadelphia. Orthopaedic Hospital of Philadelphia. Pennsylvania Hospital. Philadelphia Dispensary. St. Luke's Hospital, South Bethlehem. University Hospital. Women's Hospital of Philadelphia.
Colleges, Libraries, and Other Educational Institutions
Academy of Natural Sciences. ”

“ But in this case we cannot throw the censure for deficiency on the Legislature of the State. The wants of the community are admitted, and the right to supply those wants granted: the means are withheld by the city authority. Resolutions for building a Municipal Hospital for the reception, care and cure of those attacked with the small-pox, are adopted, and the means for carrying into effect those resolutions are supplied by the Councils of the city. ”

“ Third, we will reduce the cost of our health care by improving the quality of our health care.
It's estimated that poor quality care currently costs us up to $100 billion a year. One study found that in Pennsylvania, Medicare spent $1 billion a year just on treating infections that patients contracted while at the hospital - infections that could have easily been prevented by hospitals. This study led hospitals across the state to take action, and today some have completely eliminated infections that used to take hundreds of lives and cost hundreds of thousands of dollars every year. ”

“ On December 7 two deaths occurred and a site for a cemetery was selected on the bluff on the west bank of the Monocacy Creek.
The Moravians constantly attended the sick and Mr. Ettwein visited the patients daily. In February smallpox was brought to the hospital by some soldiers, but an epidemic was averted. On March 27, 1777, the hospital was transferred to Philadelphia.
During the time the hospital was in Bethlehem more than 100 died, coffins for whom were made by the Moravian carpenters, who also dug the graves and served at the burial of the deceased patriots. ”

“ The warden apprehends, that one class of the insane convicts would be received at the State Hospital, though the other may be excluded. Dr. Given regards the prospect of transferring any of them as far distant, while Dr. Lassiter thinks the completion of the hospital has disposed of the last obstacle to the removal of all.
If we understand the language of the trustees, it admits that a considerable number of “ordinarily” insane persons now in our State Penitentiary and in the different jails, ought to be transferred to the hospital as soon as it is so far completed as to secure them ”

“ Some of the nurses are three in a room, but quite a lot of them are only two in a room. With the portholes screwed down there is no difference between the inside and the outside rooms. The whole Pennsylvania Unit, Base Hospital No. 10, is with us, going no one knows where, any more than we do. They seem very nice people, and the Chief Nurse is the Miss Dunlop with whom I had been corresponding about work at the American Ambulance. Miss Dunlop was in charge of the nursing at the Ambulance for some time and can give me lots of pointers about foreign service. ”

“ William Lewis, London, 1761. “When the managers resolved to demand a fee for the privilege of attending the wards of the hospital, and consulted with the physicians in regard to the destination of the sum raised, these gentlemen, Thomas Bond, Phineas Bond, Cadwalader Evans, and Thomas Cadwalader, although having claims upon such gratuities, according to the custom of the British hospitals, full of scientific zeal, proposed to apply the money to the foundation of a medical library for the advantage of the pupils of the institution.” ”

“ Nurses could not be obtained even at high wages, for to nurse the victims of yellow fever meant almost certain death.
Mayor Mathew Clarkson asked for volunteers to form a Committee of Safety which should do whatever seemed possible for the health of the city. Only twelve men in that greatest of American cities answered the call, so serious was the situation.
One of these volunteers was none other than the greatest man of his day, Captain Stephen Girard. Only two of these twelve volunteered to serve at the hospital, and these heroes were Stephen Girard and Peter Helm. ”

“ And why then should the vagrant, the breaker of the peace, the drunkard, multiply his or her disease more than the sufferer by the small-pox or cholera? If the hospital for the small-pox is a retreat for the sufferer, and his family and neighborhood need to be relieved from the danger of his condition, the House of Correction would be no less an asylum for the vicious, in which they could grow better by care, and escape the evil of communicating their mental disease to their neighbors. ”

“ As it is calculated to promote the Benefit of Mankind by the improvement of the beneficent Art of Healing and to afford an opportunity to students of acquiring a regular medical education in America, it is hoped it will meet with public encouragement, more especially as the central situation of this city, the established character of the Medical Professors, the advantages of the College and of the public Hospital, all conspire to promise success to the Design. ”

“ With such a view of the prevalence of intemperance, and with such an avowal of the motives of humanity with which this Society regards all vices or crimes that go to make up the sum of the miseries of our public prisons, it may not be improper to state that among the institutions which humanity has yet to establish in Philadelphia, (it has already suggested it,) is a hospital or place of reception and treatment of inebriates. The prison punishes them, it does not cure ”

“ There are also in these institutions a few, who, from their peculiarly dangerous character, and the utter hopelessness of benefiting them by treatment, can never with propriety become inmates of the hospital. To protect the community and the ordinary insane from the dangerous propensities of these individuals, it would be necessary to introduce into our wards, intended for the treatment of disease, all the most repulsive features of a prison, or that a separate building, having strictly a prison character, should be erected upon the grounds. ”

“ Oldest and largest hospital in the world for women and children: organized, 1861. Its motto is, “Woman’s work for woman by women.”
Woman’s Medical College of Philadelphia, Twenty-first Street and North College Avenue; first college in the world organized for the education of women for the medical profession. Incorporated, 1850. Dr. Ann Preston, of first class to be graduated, was the founder of the Women’s Hospital. Contains bas-relief tablet, “The Woman Physician”; sculptor, Miss Clara Hill.
HISTORIC MUSICAL INTERESTS OF PHILADELPHIA
Academy of Music, Broad and Locust Streets. Seats 3000 ”

“ For its power is too feeble at all times, for such an amount of ventilation as an insane hospital requires, and depends wholly on the fluctuation currents of external air. If the upper range of bricks had been laid with a bevel upwards, and a plain plate of metal placed on four 84 short legs a few inches above, it would have answered equally well and at a tenth of the cost. ”

“ With my husband, we traveled through Pennsylvania, taking in our route those places which were deemed of most importance; and were thus engaged until the spring campaign commenced in Virginia.
The schools, both public and private, were also allotted as part of my field of labor. In Philadelphia and vicinity, the scholars often numbered from three to nine hundred. It has always been a matter of surprise, how intensely interested the children invariably were in the simple stories of hospital life I gave them, and the plans by which their work and offerings could be most effective. ”

“ At the Virginia Penitentiary it is our custom to thoroughly fumigate the cells that have had in them tuberculous convicts. Our hospital wards are all regularly fumigated. Especial care is given to the fumigation of mattresses and convict clothing. Our convicts are taught from time to time the necessity of not expectorating on the cell and factory floors and walls, and we post liberally signs admonishing everyone not to expectorate on the walks. ”

“ Paul, said that no physician would send a patient to a hospital for a specified number of days or weeks, yet this very thing is done daily by judges who send mentally and morally sick men and women to jail. “A doctor would not presume to predict just how many days it would take to cure a disease, but a judge daily uses his prerogative as a diagnostician in sending morally diseased people to jail, although the records of trials show that no two judges think alike in the matter. * * * Society no longer tolerates vengeance in the criminal code. ”

“ New hospitals are erected under the eaves of old hospitals. Sick and injured people are carried long, unnecessary distances at great risk. Seven new hospitals are going [Pg 632] up in Pittsburgh and yet, when they are all completed and other changes which have been decided upon are carried out, there will be a great belt of river wards, thickly populated, without a convenient hospital plant,—wards in which we shall see disease is most rife. ”