Hospitals Here and There

IN May andi June of last year I was one of those nominated to represent the Royal Victoria Hospital on a visit to some European hospitals. Ihe delegation, which consisted of members of the Board of Management and of the Visiting Staff of the hospital, had been instructed by the Board to enquire into hospital conditions abroad so that the plans under consideration for our own future buildling operations should be modified, if necessary, in the light of the experience gained. We were fortunate in having with us our consulting architects and, both in the first part of the tour to France an(d Switzerland, and in the second part to Denmark and Sweden, representatives of the Ministry of Health of the Government of Northern Ireland. All told, some twenty hospitals were visited and these included such well-known examples of modern architecture as the Beaujon Hospital, Paris; the Biurgerspital, Basle; the niew Kantonenspital, Zurich; the 'Gentofte and Ortho-paedic Hospitals, Copenhagen; the Hospitals at Roskilde and Hillerodle in Den-mark; and the Carolinska and Sddersjukhuset at Stockholm. Notes are being collected to form a comprehenisive report of the many details we studied concerning lhospital construction, layout , organisation, and working methods. TIhis paper contains one's own personal impressions of the ways in which modern hospitals abroad differ from hospitals at home. It also discusses how these differences may possibly affect our attitude towards rebuilding in the future. TIhere are hospitals in Great Britain and Northern Ireland which are superior in design to the usual types seen in most places. But this difference between individual hospital designs at home is slight when compared to that which exists between the modern continental hospitals and hospitals in Great Britain and Northern Ireland as a whole. The differences between individual hospitals at home lie chiefly in points of detail; the principles are more or less the same. XVhen hospitals at home are compared with modern hospitals abroad, fundamental principles are involved in the difference. One might say, indeed, that if the trend of thought in modern hospital design in Europe today embodies principles which constitute real advances, then all over Great Britain and Northern Ireland our hospitals are far behind th-ie times. It is for us to decide. If we conclude that the modern continental type of hospital is to be desired, then considerable reorientation of our views will be necessary before any rebuilding is considered. This …