The Guardians of St. Saviour's, Southwark, in which parish Guy's
Hospital is situated, lately thought it their duty to remon- strate with the Governors on their management of the hospital, and the reply of the Governors has been published. While re- fusing to acknowledge any responsibility to the Guardians, they think it right to state the facts. After recounting these, which are well known, they proceed to say :—" No new measures have been introduced which in any way diminish the authority of the head nurse (or sister, as she is called in the Act of Parliament which in 1724 established the hospital), or encourage nurses to act on their own responsibility, irrespective of the medical authorities ; nor is there any justification for the suggestion that the orders of any one of the medical staff with respect to a patient under his care are not, and have not been, implicitly and immediately obeyed." They deny that any religious rules exist which can override the medical treatment of the patients, and they affirm that the closest inquiry has failed to discover the particulars on which the competence of the nurses is denied. The Governors are perfectly ready to amend any obnoxious rules, but if the medical staff will not attend the weekly committee, the Governors cannot act. The Governors are aware that "certain consequences" of their acts have been for some time obviously impending, but they cannot shrink from duties imposed upon them by Act of Parliament. The whole tone of the reply, of which we can this week give but the briefest account, is moderate and reserved, but suggests throughout that the Governors blame the medical staff for the attitude they have assumed.
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