The Rural Hospital [antikvár]

INTRODUCTION It is hard to say exactly what is meant by'' rural hospital" because of the many different forms the institution may take. Looked at from the socio-biological standpoint, the rural hospital is the smallest curative unit serving a rural community, and its structure varies with the basic features of country life. In western countries the rural hospital has retained the impress of a fairly lengthy past when its sole function was to provide hospital care for the sick. At present there is a strong tendency to expand the scope of the hospital to cover the whole community, through out-patient care and preventive measures. The rural hospital may also cover health education in rural communities and serve as a demonstration centre for general hygiene work. Countries which do not as yet possess a system of rural hospitals can introduce this concept of combined health activities by creating hospital/ health-centres responsible for safeguarding all aspects of the population's health. This is a course which will be enlarged upon in the following pages. Although apparently simple, it can take a wide variety of forms. The hospital/health-centre must not be regarded as an isolated unit. What has to be avoided at all costs is that the development of a network of rural institutions should lead to a twofold health system, thus accentuating the distinction between town and country. In some countries this twofold system is gradually dying out, owing to general development of the economy and the growth of communications; countrydwellers are within easy reach of town, and urban services are being extended to the country. It would be highly inappropriate, therefore, to encourage a hospital system which emphasizes a twofold concept, existing less in reality than in words. The hospital/health-centre in its most comprehensive form should provide the surrounding district with preventive and curative services and, at the same time, should serve as an outpost for the hospitalization of confirmed cases of disease. Such is the definition which this study will endeavour to justify. One should not be taken in, however, by its apparent simplicity. A host of questions immediately arises. How many confirmed cases are accounted for by endemic disease ? Where are infectious patients to be placed? What provision is made for maternity? What is to be done with social cases and convalescents ? These questions alone indicate the — 9 —