Management of Tuberculous Patients in a General Hospital

¹ Division of Medicine, North Shore Hospital, Manhasset, New York

1. One hundred and eleven tuberculous patients were treated medically and surgically in a general hospital from 1953 to 1959.

2. Only 20 patients with active tuberculosis were transferred to tuberculosis hospitals or sanatoria.

3. Thirty-seven patients with active tuberculosis were discharged from the hospital for care by the family physician under the direction of the phthisiologist.

4. Fifty-four patients with inactive pulmonary tuberculosis, who were hospitalized for late nonspecific pulmonary or cardiac complications or for other diseases were screened from transfer to tuberculosis institutions.

5. Many patients were screened for the various forms of acid-fast pulmonary diseases, the diagnosis of nontuberculous pulmonary diseases and the exclusion of these from transfer to the sanatoria, where superinfection is a real possibility.