The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1929-11-06
GROWING NEED
Seen FOR u. S.
HOSPITAL AID
Government Must Act to
Help Average American,
Says Doctor.

By EHA SerUtce
NEW ORLEANS, Nov. g.
American hospitals must get sub
stantial government help if proper
medical treatment Is to be brought
within the reach Of the great ma
jurity of the American people.
This IS the conclusion of DR.. C.
JEFF Miller, president-elect OF the
greatest surgical body in the world,
the American College Of Surgeons.
In an interview, DR.. Miller ad-
mitted that modern hospital treat
ment means financial shipwreck for
ths average American-whose in
come, according to government
figures, is well below $4,000 a year.
A siege of illness in the family,
he said, often puts such man
under a load of debt that 1t takes
years to lift.
Aid Held Necessary
''The only solution that can
see is governmental aid for the
hospitals" he declared.
Whether the appropriations come
from federal, state or city govern
ments, or from all of them, Is de-
tail that the people themselves must
work out. Certainly the professional
standards of the hospitals can not
be lowered. Nor can the hospital
authorities and doctors be blamed.
THE advance of modern medi-
cal science necessarily has added
enormously to the cost Of hospital
treatment.
For instance: patients now know
that their condition can be de-
termined far more accurately than
ever before by blood test or X-ray
studies. These things cost money.
SAYS Minimum is Reached
Hospital experts have brought
the cost of hospital service as low
as possible, considering the stand
ards that must be maintained.
when you consider that good
hotel room costs you from SIS to
SIS a day, and then consider that
hospital with its necessary adj
iuncts OF nursing department,
dressing department, X-ray depart
ment, pathological laboratories,
diet kitchens and so on, gives you
room for around $40 day you can
see that its costs are not exorbitant.
yet $40 a day for hospital
room means financial shipwreck
for many a man. The only solu-
ton we can see in the American
College of Surgeons is governmental
aid"
DR.. Miller took occasion to
puncture an ancient jest-the
charge that the doctor is always
trying to find an excuse to per-
form an operation.
Operation Jest Punctured
1.-THE surgeons themselves are
working the hardest to diminish the
number of operations" he said.
We operate when, to the best of
our knowledge. an operation is I'M
avoidable. But the progress or
surgery in the last twenty years
seems little short of miraculous.
Operations are performed today
with the assurance that the dam
ger to the patient is of the slightest,
where ten years ago the death rate
was Is to Is per cent"
The interviewer mentioned pro-
hjbition. DR.. Miller remarked that
he was somewhat averse to discus
sing the subject, as 1T has got to
a point in America where discussing
prohibition is almost like discussing
religion"
He suggested that prohibition
could not be successfully enforced
until a great campaign of education
costing perhaps as much as is now
spent on prohibition enforcement,
IS held.
"a vast campaign Of education
along the line of temperance is the
necessary prelude to any possibility
of enforcement" he said. 1.-THE
American people must be taught
that excess is the real evil. mean
excess In anything as well as in
alcohol.
In America today the danger in
food consumed in excessive quanti-
ties is far greater than the danger
of the excessive drinking of alco-
honc beverages"