(2.) 20-Bed Ward requires 3½ Attendants.
(2.) With a ward of 20 patients (cut, scheme, and arrange the hours and duties as you will), you cannot efficiently serve it with less than
- ½ Head-Nurse—Female.
- 3 Orderlies.
And the other ward of this Head Nurse ought to be on the same floor.
N. B.—The same number would quite as efficiently serve a ward of 25 or even 30 patients.
(3.) 10-Bed Ward cannot be served by 1 Orderly + ⅕ Nurse.
(3.) The Army system of 1 Orderly to 10 patients, with a number not exceeding 10 patients to a ward, is upset as immediately by one bad case among the 10, as by 9 to the 10.
For, is the same Orderly to be on duty for the 24 hours?
The difficulty is practically got over by the Army, with a permission that any “bad case” may select any one he likes of his comrades (out of the Depôt) to be “told off,” to attend upon him.
This extraordinary regulation is equivalent to (and affords little other practical result, than) granting opportunity for any quantity of spirits, and illicit food, to be smuggled into Hospital, and it is clear that it would be totally inadmissible in a General Hospital, where the whole system of nursing would be under the most stringent discipline and supervision.