2
Admissions and re-admissions.
4. The number of inmates remaining over from 1902 was 162 in Nagpur and
155 in Jubbulpore. During the triennium, the admissions
and re-admissions in Nagpur were 26 in 1903, 28 in 1904
and 46 in 1905, (as compared with 25 in 1900, 23 in 1901, 35 in 1902), and in
jubbulpore 18 in 1903, 26 in 1904 and 22 in 1905 against 28, 19 and 21 during
the three years preceding. The slight increase in admissions in Nagpur in 1903
and 1904 may probably be due to closer supervision exercised by the Police over
vagrant lunatics, but the striking increase in 1905 is due mainly to the admission
of insanes from Central India, in accordance with Government of India, Home
Department, letter No. 241, dated the 8th March 1905. The Jubbulpore Asylum
being already overcrowded, some lunatics from the northern districts were, in
addition, admitted to the Nagpur Asylum.
Discharges.
5. The number of lunatics discharged from the Nagpur Asylum during
the triennium was 63—20 in 1903, 21 in 1904 and 22 in
1905, as compared with 64 in the preceding triennium—
34 in 1900, 18 in 1901 and 12 in 1902. Of the 63, as many as 47 were dis-
charged "cured", 12 as "improved" and 2 as "not improved". Two were
discharged as "otherwise" and transferred to the Nagpur Central Jail as proba-
tionary convict warders. It has been the practice in both asylums to show
recovered criminal lunatics transferred to jails as discharged "otherwise". This
is not correct, and I agree with Colonel Poynder that such men should properly
be shown as discharged "cured ", inasmuch as the asylum is only concerned
with the effects of the mental treatment and not with the criminal aspect of the
case. When a criminal lunatic who had been remanded to jail or sent up as fit
for trial returns to the asylum, he should be shown as a re-admission. With the
exception of 3 cases of melancholia, those discharged " cured" had suffered
from mania. The period of residence of those discharged varied from 2 months
to 12 years.
In the Jubbulpore Asylum the number discharged was 13 in 1903, 21 each in
1904 and 1905, making a total of 55 during the triennium, as compared with
24 in 1900, 15 each in 1901 and 1902 or 54 in all during the preceding three
years. Of the 55, 46 were discharged "cured", 4 as " improved" and 5 as
"otherwise".
The patients discharged as " otherwise " were mostly criminal lunatics dis-
charged and re-admitted as non-criminals.
Sickness and mortality.
6. The admissions into hospital at the Nagpur Asylum were 95 in 1903,
29 in 1904 and 39 in 1905, making a total of 163 for the
triennium, against 245 during the preceding period, the
chief causes being influenza, epilepsy, debility, old age and fever. In the
Jubbulpore Asylum, 50, 97 and 49 insanes were admitted into the-hospital
(chiefly for malarial fevers, bronchitis, asthma, diarrhœa and epilepsy), in
the years 1903, 1904 and 1905 respectively, or a total of 196 during the triennial
period, against 261 in the preceding triennium. The daily average sick at Nag-
pur was 10.33 in 1903, 13.10 in 1904 and 4.69 in 1905, against 12.98 in 1900,
10.08 in 1901 and 8.72 in 1902; and at Jubbulpore it was 1.85, 3.63 and 3.54
in 1903. 1904 and 1905, as compared with 2.75, 2.97 and 2.19 in the three years
preceding. The Nagpur Asylum was unhealthy throughout the past two trien-
niums, except in 1905, when it wonderfully improved. This may be due to the
change made in the diet at the end of the year 1904, when wheat was substituted
for jowar.
At Nagpur also the mortality was high during the triennium, 50 lunatics
dying; 14 in 1903, 19 in 1904, and 17 in 1905, against 36 in the preceding trien-
nium: the causes being failure of heart (in very old and feeble lunatics) (11),
epilepsy (17), pulmonary phthisis (3), pneumonia (2), septicæmia (2), malarial
fevers and dysentery (13). Of the remaining two one was a case of murder
and the other of suicide by hanging, both of which occurred in 1904 and were
mentioned in the notes for that year. In Jubbulpore 29 patients died (8 in 1903
9 in 1904 and 12 in 1905) against 20 in the preceding triennium, the causes
including spontaneous rupture of the heart (1), congestion of brain (1), both
these being sudden, general exhaustion (1), plague (1), asthma (1) mental
stupor (1), diarrhœa (1), epilepsy (2), anæmia (2). The remainder were due
to extreme old age, in hopelessly chronic patients who had remained long under
reatment and for months together were fed by attendants. The unhealthiness.