Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1956-02-15
Farley Put Over
On City Hospital
Critical Needs
Doctors Will Press
For More Nurses
Letter This Week

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District Commissioner Robert
E. Mclaughlin will meet soon,
possibly later this week. with
public health officials to try to
alleviate critical supply short
ages at District General Hos
Ipital.
A meeting first was set up fol-
today. The transit hearing be-
fore Congress this afternoon ne
cessitated cancellation of the
session, however.
The main purpose Of the
meeting is to try to pick out
of the morass of hospital needs
a relatively small number Of the
most essential. with the pos
sibility of adding them to the
city budget for the year start
ing July /.
Studies leading toward this
possibility, it was learned, have
been under way for several
weeks.
Doctors at the hospital, each
acutely aware of his own needs,
have agreed jointly to subordi-
nate some of them If hospital
officials will press for what is
Unanimously felt to be the most
essential-more nurses.
The hospital medical chiefs
said they expressed this senti-
ment to DR.. P. A. E. Stebbing,
District General superintendent,
at a staff session yesterday.
Virtually No Increases
As it went to Capitol Hill. the
Commissioners budget for next
year reflected virtually no in
creaseS for the city hospital
despite substantial boosts re-
Iquested by both hospital and
Health Department officials.
Some city officials feel that
the size of these requests, and
health officials refusal to pin
point certain needs with higher
priority than others. has hurt
the hospitals chances of getting
more money.
About a year ago the hospital
doctors submitted a report to the
Commissioners setting forth
needs as they saw them. The
cost was more than So million.
Later last year the medical
chiefs culled out about $l.2 mil
lion worth Of top-priority needs
which they characterized as the
absolutely rock bottom"
Indications are that the health
officials today talked in terms Of
about half that amount in hos
lpital increases for next year.
The doctors maintain that any
cut in their $1.2 million rock
bottom" needs will mean drastic
reductions in service. They take
the position that they are un-
able, as doctors, to assume the
responsibility for any such cuts.
at isn't q question Of Just
maintaining a certain level of
medical care" one of them said.
I'VE have already cut all over
the hospital to an irreducible
minimum. In our clinics, we've
cut back by spending less and
less time with patients-to the
point that we can't cut any
further. The responsibility from
here on is going to have to be in
the hands Of those who tell us
what to cut"
"a More Nurses
Despite refusal to assign pri-
critics to the $1.2 million needs,
however, the medical chiefs of
various departments agreed that
nursing is the hospitals greatest
single deficiency. Their rock
bottom" list said "a more staff
nurses are needed.
AS of January 4, DR.. Stebbing
said, about so of the 1877 author
lied nurse positions were vacant.
Twenty-four Of the so vacant
Jobs. however. have been frog
en-" so that money for them could
be used to hire IS practical on
a temporary" basis.
DR.. Stebbing feels that the
Iwisest move is to seek separate
money to pay for the practical
nurses, so the "a vacant jobs
could be "unfrozen." He takes
the position that. with so vacant
jobs, Congress would be reluctant
to authorize more.
The doctors, however, argue
that the reason nursing jobs are
vacant is that so few are author
lied that new nurses are re-
luctant to come to District
General.