REPORT ON THE DULLUNDA LUNATIC ASYLUM
FOR THE YEAR 1872.
By Surgeon R. BIRD, M.D., Officiating Superintendent.
Population.
Admissions.
Re-admissions.
2. Population.—On the 1st January 1872, 325 insanes remained over from 1871 in
this asylum. This is the largest population of the same date in any year for the last
ten years. The number exceeded that of 1st January 1871 by 8, and the average popula-
tion for the same dates in the last ten years by 99. The admissions reached 191, and the
re-admissions, 28. The joint number is greater than the combined number of admissions and
re-admissions of any year since the asylum was established, greater by 22. In 1867 the
numbers were 197, and in 1868, 196. This excess of admissions in 1872 is probably to be
explained in the same way as excess in the numbers of cholera or fever patients in certain
years is explained. Insanity is more prevalent in one year than it is in another. Of the
re-admissions, 11 were from repeated indulgence in ganjah ; 2 were prisoners returned from
trial; and the causes of return in eight instances are unknown.
Total treated.
Five hundred and forty-four persons were treated in the year. This total exceeds the total
of any other year by 51, and the average total of the last ten years by 164. With one
exception, the total number treated has steadily increased year by year in the last ten years,
from 273 in 1862 to 544 in 1872. The exception occurred in 1865 and 1866. In the former
year 389 persons were treated, whereas in 1866 only 364 were treated.
Cures.
3. Cures.—The cures last year numbered 70, being 1.8 below the average number of
cures in the last ten years, and 43 below the largest numbers recorded in the history of the
asylum; the cures in 1865 having numbered 113. The number of cures has doubtless been
lessened by the larger number of transfers, which in the year amounted to 41—the largest
number transferred in one year since 1862.
Deaths.
Smallest morta
lity among female
patients.
4. Deaths. —There were 44 deaths in the year; 6 of which were amongst the women.
This small mortality amongst the women, as compared with that amongst the men, corre-
sponds with the mortality of 1871, when 32 men died and 4 women. In the other years of
the decade, in which the year under review is considered, the mortality amongst the female
patients was remarkably heavy ; 24 in 1866 having died out of a total of 82 treated, i.e.,
29.2 per cent.; while the percentage of deaths amongst the women treated in 1872 was only
4.8. It is difficult to explain this difference, but doubtless the recent improvements in the
hygienic and sanitary conditions of the asylum have had much to say to the lessened mortality.
The percentage of deaths amongst the men in 1872 was 9, or a little more than double the
mortality amongst the women. This is noteworthy, as the men are less crowded and better
housed than the women. Indeed, the crowding of the latter is excessive, and in other respects,
as will be noted hereafter, the female patients are not so well off as the male patients.
Causes of death.
Nineteen of the deaths were due to dysentery, and 3 to exhaustion, 2 to phthisis, 3 to
anæmia, 2 to diarrhœa, and 1 to old age. These diseases, in most instances, were chronic, and
merely symptomatic of the slow decay, depending on a general vitality too low to contend with
the influence of external agencies. One death was caused by cholera, and one ensued on
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