The Life of Florence Nightingale, vol. 1 of 2Cook, Edward Tyas, Sir
History
The Life of Florence Nightingale, vol. 1 of 2
Cook, Edward Tyas, Sir
Nightingale, Florence, 1820-1910
Whether, in any new plan, the House Stewards have the command of
the Orderlies, or the Medical Man, which I am incompetent to
determine, whichever it be let us have a Governor of the Hospital.
As it is a Military Hospital, a Military Head is probably necessary
as Governor.
On September 20, 1855, a Royal Warrant was issued, reorganizing the
Medical Staff Corps, "for the better care of the sick and wounded,"
revising the duties of the several officers, and improving their pay.
Any one who cares to refer to this Warrant, and to compare it with Miss
Nightingale's letters just given, will see that in large measure her
suggestions were adopted by the War Department.
Miss Nightingale was careful, as we have seen, not to interfere with the
doctors, and, though she thought that as administrators some of them
were ineffective, she bore willing testimony to their skill and devotion
(with some few exceptions) in their proper work. But she could not
abstain from deploring one great omission, and she offered to subscribe
largely towards repairing it:--
"One thing which we much require," she wrote to Mr. Herbert (Feb.
22, 1855), "might easily be done. This is the formation of a
Medical School at Scutari. We have lost the finest opportunity for
advancing the cause of Medicine and erecting it into a Science
which will probably ever be afforded. There is here no operating
room, no dissecting room; post-mortem examinations are seldom made,
and then in the dead-house (the ablest Staff Surgeon here told me
that he considered that he had killed hundreds of men owing to the
absence of these) no statistics are kept as to between what ages
most deaths occur, as to modes of treatment, appearances of the
body after death, etc., etc., etc., and all the innumerable and
most important points which contribute to making Therapeutics a
means of saving life, and not, as it is here, a formal duty. Our
registration generally is so lamentably defective that often the
only record kept is--_a man died_ on such a day. There is a kiosk
on the Esplanade before the Barrack Hospital, rejected by the
Quarter-Master for his stores, which I have asked for and obtained
as a School of Medicine. It is not used now for any purpose--£300
or £400 (which I would willingly give) would put it in a state of
repair. It is not overlooked and is in every way calculated for the
purpose I have named. The Medical teaching duties could not be
carried on efficiently with a less staff than two lecturers on
Physiology and Pathology, and one lecturer on Anatomy, who will be
employed in preparing the subject for demonstration, and performing
operations for the information of the Juniors."
This suggestion also was in part adopted. An excellent dissecting-room
was built, provided with numerous instruments, microscopes and other
apparatus.[138]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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