136 ADMINISTRATIVE SECTION 



than two to one. The mortality as compared with 

 the admissions from 1883 to 1901 showed that it 

 ranged from 36 to 81 per cent, with an average of 

 38 per cent. In 1901 this institution was changed 

 into a babies' hospital and the name incorporated 

 as St. Margaret's House and Hospital for Infants. 

 During this period there has been a marked increase 

 in the number of sick babies sent by their parents 

 for active medical treatment, and notwithstanding the 

 fact that sick babies were admitted, the mortality has 

 ranged from 10 to 25 per cent, with an average of 16 

 per cent. This lessened mortality has been coinci- 

 dent with placing the institution on a hospital basis, 

 closer medical and nursing care of the babies, and 

 the establishment of a training school for nursery 

 maids. Under this arrangement there is one nurse 

 to care for every four babies, which ensures more 

 individual care and personal attention to the babies. 

 These nursemaids become very fond of their little 

 charges and the babies receive a certain amount of 

 affection and care, which is best expressed by the 

 term "mothering," and this. is encouraged. 



Dr. Holt, in his Presidential address last year 

 before the American Association for the Study and 

 Prevention of Infant Mortality, laid great emphasis 

 on the educational value of the babies' hospital. He 

 pointed out the fact that these hospitals do much more 

 for the community than care for the sick poor. They 

 instruct the medical profession and offer exceptional 

 opportunity for the study and prevention of disease 

 in infants. Nurses and nursery maids are given first- 

 hand knowledge of many things relating to the care 

 and feeding of infants, so that they can more intelli- 

 gently impart this knowledge to ignorant mothers. 



The solution to the problem of the institutional 

 infant is to do away with the so-called infant asylums. 

 The foundling and motherless baby should be pro- 

 vided with a suitable home with wet-nursing, and the 

 mother and her infant should never be separated. 



