Every sick case should therefore be completely isolated, in a separate sick ward, from the lying-in women. And if admitted before delivery, her delivery should take place in this separate ward.
N.B. The nurse’s dinner and meals may be prepared in the general kitchen and sent to her. The patient’s arrowroot, gruel, &c., must be made, and her beef-tea warmed, in the ‘sick or segregation’ building, and all linen must be sent to the ward well aired.
Is it desirable to connect the ‘segregation’ ward by any covered passage with the rest of the lying-in institution?
There is much to be said for and against.
The ward, it is to be hoped, will not often have to be used at all.
But small-pox has appeared after labour.
There might be danger in taking a patient from the institution to this ward through the open air, in all weathers, unprotected by any covered passage.
On the other hand, when once the patient is in the ward, complete isolation is by far the best, for the sake of all the others.
And there is by no means the same necessity for a passage as in the other parts of the institution where any night there may be three or four ordinary delivery cases to be conveyed through the passages.
A covered ambulance for sick cases is not, however, a nice thing, though often suggested.[[22]]