IDENTITY STATEMENT
Reference code(s): O/234
Held at: London Metropolitan Archives
Title: GREAT ORMOND STREET HOSPITAL FOR SICK CHILDREN
Date(s): 1891
Level of description: Collection
Extent: 0.16 linear metres
Name of creator(s): Hospital for Sick Children | Great Ormond Street x Great Ormond Street Hospital
CONTEXT
Administrative/Biographical history:
Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH) was founded in February 1852. It was the first specialist children's hospital, and it has grown to an internationally famous centre of excellence in child healthcare. Much has changed in medicine over that time but GOSH is committed to delivering the best and most up to date treatment now and in the future.
The hospital treats 100,000 patients a year; both at its central London site and through clinics scattered across the country. It offers the largest range of children's medical specialists under one roof, so children with some of the rarest and most complex problems can be treated. In addition to its medical care, GOSH researches childhood illness, and plays a major role in training children's doctors and nurses.
At the time GOSH was founded, children's life expectancy was pitifully low. There was widespread poverty, malnutrition and disease. Medicine was also extremely primitive, with no antibiotics, no antiseptics and no real understanding of infection. But modern medicine was beginning to emerge, with mass vaccination and the start of the public health movement, and anaesthetics began to make surgery more practical.
Founder Dr Charles West had a vision, that children were not just little copies of adults, they needed their own sort of doctors and nurses. His book "How to nurse sick children" predates Florence Nightingale's nursing manual. The hospital's motto is "The Child first and always" and GOSH has always strived to put the patient at the centre of its care. Children's hospitals are now very different from Victorian days - bright, open and cheerful, with unlimited visiting by families.
Since 1948, GOSH has been part of the NHS and proud to offer children its specialist care for free. It is part of a network of specialist children's services across the country. The pace of medical development has speeded up, even fifty years ago antibiotics and heart surgery were radical new treatments - now we correct congenital heart abnormalities within days of birth, and plan gene therapy to correct inborn diseases.
CONTENT
Scope and content/abstract:
Booklet by the Hospital for Sick Children, Great Ormond Street, giving map of location of hospital, list of staff, the objects of the institution, attendance of medical officers, rules for students and clinical clerks and fees for hospital practice, 1891.
ACCESS AND USE
Language/scripts of material: English
System of arrangement:
One booklet.
Conditions governing access:
Available for general access.
Conditions governing reproduction:
Copyright: City of London
Physical characteristics:
Fit
Finding aids:
Please see online catalogues at: http://search.lma.gov.uk/opac_lma/index.htm
ARCHIVAL INFORMATION
Appraisal, destruction and scheduling information:
Accruals:
Archival history:
Immediate source of acquisition:
Received in 1967. AC/67/036.
ALLIED MATERIALS
Existence and location of originals:
Existence and location of copies:
Related material:
Publication note:
DESCRIPTION NOTES
Note:
Date(s) of descriptions: January 2009