PAPERS ON MEDICINE AND PUBLIC HEALTH 449 



pital or have gained control of the staff of an exist- 

 ing hospital of the Type III, just described. The Mu- 

 nicipal Hospital movement has been brought about by 

 those physicians and public spirited citizens who sensed, 

 if they were not fully cognizant, of the unfair discrimina- 

 tion of the Type III hospitals. 



In view of the fact that in the organization of St. 

 John's Hospital, of Springfield, Illinois, we believe that 

 we have met satisfactorily these three most important 

 problems, I would like to take up the story of the way 

 this has been done. From the standpoint of the Mini- 

 mum Standard, but without a staff, we are able to give 

 equal privileges to physicians, to give the patient the 

 freedom in his choice of a physician, to give the greatest 

 scientific care to the patient, to bring about with the 

 greatest ease interchange of opinion among physicians, 

 to give the greatest facilities for consultations, and to 

 establish a very satisfactory system for maintaining 

 present and future records, and we are maintaining un- 

 excelled laboratory facilities, and an X-Ray department 

 of the highest type. From the standpoint of Group Medi- 

 cine, the hospital organization has offered every con- 

 venience for supplementing the efforts of several clinics. 

 From the standpoint of the Municipal Hospital, the de- 

 mands of the public and of the profession have been met 

 by maintaining every requirement from the Free Dis- 

 pensary to the most satisfactory type of private room. 



Inasmuch as the hospital has passed through the per- 

 iod of organization under a closed staff, the period of a 

 partly closed and open staff, and a long period of organi- 

 zation without a staff, we feel that our experience justi- 

 fies us in speaking with authority on the advantages 

 of each type. As evidence of the growth of the insti- 

 tution, through these varying periods, I wish to submit 

 the following: chart. 



