Singapore Hospitals

HOSPITALS.
Malay Name — Rumah Orang Sakit
Places of Worship and Hospitals, 69

1. The General Hospital is a large and airy building at Sepoy Lines, two miles from the centre of the town. Here originally stood the Sepoy Barracks, where troops were stationed in the days of the East India Company. Till about ten years ago, the General Hospital was in the Bukit Timah Road — the building now called the Lock Hospital — but owing to an epidemic scare, the patients were transferred to the Sepoy Barracks, and these soon being found inadequate for local requirements, the present roomy building was erected in 1882.

Two large barrack- wards, 169 ft, by 51 ft., containing 40 beds each, with other smaller wards, occupy the upper storey. A cool verandah runs round the building, and by this and other means the Hospital is kept well ventilated. There are two small female wards in an attap-roofed bungalow, detached from the main building.

The diseases treated in the Hospital are general. The number of patients treated during 1890 was 2,455; of these 2103 were discharged and 73 died.

The nurses at the General Hospital are Sisters from the Convent of the Holy Infant Jesus; and there is but one opinion in Singapore about the way in which they discharge their duties.

2. The Lunatic Asylum is also at Sepoy Lines, on a hill near the Criminal Prison. After the transference of the General Hospital from Bukit Timah Road to Sepoy Lines, the old building was used for some years as a Lunatic Asylum, until the present asylum was ready for occupation. The number of patients received during 1890 was 254.

3. The Lock Hospital in Bukit Timah Road, was originally the General Hospital and afterwards the Lunatic Asylum. It is now used as a Hospital for contagious diseases. It is a low one-storey building, containing two wards, each containing about twelve beds.

Malay Name — Rumah Orang Gila, 70
Handbook to Singapore

4. The Tan Tock Seng or Pauper Hospital, the largest Hospital in the Colony, is situated in Serangoon Road, three miles from town. Founded by the late Mr. Tan Tock Seng, a wealthy Chinese gentleman, in 1844, it was added to in 1854, by his son Mr. Tan Kim Ching, the late Siamese Consul in Singapore, who died in the present year, and in 1887 by subscriptions from the Chinese community. The Hospital has room for more than 600 patients at one time. There are 17 wards in all; twelve of a large and five of moderate size. The building, which has a very pleasing appearance externally, stands in grounds of about 18 acres in extent. 5,891 patients were treated in 1890, of whom 4,319 were discharged, cured or relieved, and 948 died.

5. The Prison Hospital. See p. 49.

6. The Leper Hospital is on Balestier Plain, behind the Tan Tock Seng Hospital.

7. The Maternity Hospital and Out Door Dispensary is in Victoria Street, near Stamford Road, about a quarter of a mile from the Cathedral.

8. The Quarantine Hospital is in St. John's Island in the Singapore Strait, at the Quarantine Station. The Government Grants to hospitals in Singapore, amounted in 1890 to $51,959.10, exclusive of Medical Officers' salaries.

Source:
Handbook to Singapore (Internet Digital Archive)
http://www.archive.org/stream/handbooktosinga00reitgoog/handbooktosinga00reitgoog_djvu.txt

External links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_hospitals_in_Singapore
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kandang_Kerbau_Women%27s_and_Children%27s_Hospital