From Ken Green
Linda Geddes asks for evidence of how much a restful atmosphere contributes to healing, stating this is “something health chiefs are sure to demand before making changes in our hospitals” (9 May, p 45). I suspect that Geddes is under 40 years of age, as hospitals have already changed in ways that make them almost unrecognisable compared with those of my youth.
Around 1930, I lost an argument with a 10-pint iron saucepan filled with boiling stew and awoke several days later in the Middlesex Hospital in London. My memories of that place are predominantly green: paint, tiles, curtains and aprons. The hardwood floors were highly polished – clean, but lethal for the less sure-footed.
The wards were huge and high, with an acoustic that must have delighted the devil himself. Heating was provided by double-sided open coal fires, with an attendant clatter of coal buckets, fire irons and ash pans. Beds, trolleys and folding screens were all moved on noise-generators known euphemistically as wheels.
Truly, it was better to die at home than to be cured in a hospital. Today I rather enjoy an enforced sojourn therein.
Advertisement
Penpethy, Cornwall, UK
