§ MR. EATONasked the Secretary of State for War, How many deaths occurred in the Royal Infirmary, Dublin, during the first week of March 1885; if it is true that there are no Military surgeons or orderlies of the Medical Staff Corps doing duty at the Royal Infirmary, and the patients are attended by untrained soldiers from the various regiments in the garrison; if it is true that, under the former regimental system, trained regimental hospital orderlies would have been available to attend patients belonging to their own regiments; and, if he will take steps to provide trained female nurses to attend to the more serious cases in the Royal Infirmary and other large Military hospitals?
THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONDuring the first week of March two deaths occurred in the Royal Infirmary, Dublin. According to the latest Returns, there were on duty in this hospital one surgeon-major in charge, four civilian surgeons, one sergeant of the Medical Staff Corps, with orderlies from Line regiments. It is quite true that under the former system the hospital orderlies would have been drawn from the regiments, and that they would have had a certain amount of hospital training, though far less than is now given to men of the Medical Staff Corps. Under that system, during war the regimental hospitals at home would have had their own orderlies; but in the field the trained orderlies would have had to be largely supplemented by untrained men, on whom the base hospitals would probably have entirely depended. At present, when an army is in. the field, the hospitals at home afford for it an ample supply of trained orderies, though their employment necessarily, to some extent, denudes for the time the hospitals at home. An augmentation in the female nursing staff at home is proposed in the Estimates for the ensuing year.