Evening star., 1955-05-19
Citizens Urge Expansion
For Freedmen's S Hospital

A blueprint with its design
for promising future for
Freedmen's Hospital and the
Medical School of Howard Uni
versity was unrolled today.
Drawn up by a citizens COM
| mission. appointed by Secretary
of Welfare Hobby. the plans
carried recommendations that
| would entirely change the
character of the 90-year-old
hospital and greatly strengthen
the machinery used to train
colored physicians and nurses.
Ask New Hospital
Salient recommendations made
by the 12-member Freedmen'S
Hospital Study Commission
asked that:
/. A 400-bed, So million hos
pital be constructed on the
grounds of Howard University,
using the present 130-bed tuber-
culosis building and replacing
the present hospital. The new
plant would have facilities COM
parable to those Of the hospitals
of George Washington and
Georgetown Universities.
2. Ownership, control and
supervision of the hospital be
removed from the Department
of Health, Education and We'll
fare and vested in the Howard
University Board Of Trustees.
/ 3. Cost of the new hospital
be borne entirely by the Federal
Government-but afterward the
hospital would work toward
financial independence as its
private" status is gradually
achieved.
4. Congress enact during the
present session legislation in
cooperating essential elements Of
the commissions recommended
tions.
In its study Of the future Of
Freedmen's, the commission said
it recognized that, until the
doors of hospitals and medical
schools throughout the United
States are opened wide, both
Freedmen's Hospital and How
ard University must give primary
attention to the needs of the
Negro"
The commission also "looked
ahead to that time when the
hospital and the university . .
will have become fully inte-
grated into American life" un-
der non-segregation.
Set Up After Civil War
Freedmens Hospital was set
UP to meet the health needs of
the ex-slave population, which
came to Washington in great
numbers after the Civil War.
It served, for many years, on a
non-segregated basis as charity
hospital and then, in 1912, was
authorized by Congress to admit
fee-paying patients. Its control,
from time to time, has been
under the War Department, In
terror Department, District OF
Columbia and, today, HEW.
It has served, from the be-
ginning, as the teaching facility
for Howard University College
of Medicine and has turned out
about half of the country's COL
ored physicians.
Until recently the hospital
had become, as the commission
points out, a virtually segregated
institution: The only institution
open to the colored patient and
the only place for the colored
physician to take his patient.
But with the administrations S
policies on non-segregation, Su-
preme Court decisions and re-
cent trends toward community
integration. a question of the
Federal Governments relation
ship to the hospital was raised,
particularly with regard to flnan-
cial support, the commission
said.
Finds Continuing Need
The commission was appoint
ed by Secretary Hobby this year
to explore the financial question
but also to determine If there
was a continuing and future
need for Freedmen's.
Unequivocally, the commission
said there was and based its
finding on q national shortage
Of medical, nursing and allied
professional personnel in gen.
eral and particularly in colored
medical personnel.
The commission stated that
Howard University could not
perform its teaching function in
meeting these needs with the
present "obsolete, outmoded and
uneconomlcal general hospital
plant" It emphasized the "pri-
mary purpose Of the new hos
pital would be to serve as a
teaching function"
Observing that Providence and
Gi1oIov IJoSy,ito1r will sooy, ho