A few weeks ago I wrote about some of the ward names at Old Addenbrooke’s. As I am sure most of your know the wards at the ‘new site’ do not have names, but the first four wards at the Rosie did. The Rosie was built on three floors with four wards each having 26 …
Month: June 2018
Lewin Stroke & Rehabilitation Unit
Recently I had a friend who had a member of her family with a head injury and had to make use of the Lewin Rehabilitation Unit. She wondered why it was called Lewin, I was able to tell her that the Unit is named after, Mr Walpole S Lewin (1915-1980) a consultant neurosurgeon working in …
Waterloo and Addenbrooke’s
The 18th June is the anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo. While carrying out some research recently I came across this entry in the minutes of the Weekly Meeting of the Governors on 27 July 1818: ‘Wm Ford a distressed patient and a Waterloo man this day discharged from the Hospital was relieved with 10s …
Expansion of the Hospital
A few weeks ago I wrote about the suggested improvements to the original hospital in 1860. Matthew Digby Wyatt had been appointed architect for the work in early 1863, but his proposed plans were rejected at the next General Quarterly Court. They wanted the Building Committee ‘to consider whether it is practicable to build a …
Dr John Addenbrooke
Today the 8th June is the anniversary of the death Dr John Addenbrooke, the founder of Addenbrooke’s Hospital. He died in 1719 at the age of 39 at his home in Buntingford. Not much is known about Addenbrooke himself, but there is a description of him written by his servant, Mary Collis, she said he …
The introduction of Anaesthesia at Addenbrooke’s
The first successful public administration of ether for a surgical operation was in Boston, USA on 16 October 1846, within weeks it was being used in London, so when was the first use of anaesthetics at Addenbrooke’s? As we do not have any patient case notes for that time, I thought the best place to …
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