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Rotunda Hospital

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The Rotunda Hospital (Irish: Ospidéal an Rotunda;[1] legally the Hospital for the Relief of Poor Lying-in Women, Dublin)[2] is a maternity hospital on Parnell Street in Dublin, Ireland, now managed by RCSI Hospitals.[3] The Rotunda entertainment buildings in Parnell Square are no longer part of the hospital complex.

Rotunda Hospital
Health Service Executive - RCSI Hospitals
Rotunda Hospital frontage on Parnell Street
Rotunda Hospital is located in Central Dublin
Rotunda Hospital
Shown in Dublin
Geography
LocationParnell Square East, Rotunda, D01 P5W9, Dublin, Ireland
Coordinates53°21′09″N 6°15′45″W / 53.3526°N 6.2626°W / 53.3526; -6.2626
Organisation
Care systemHSE
TypeSpecialist
Affiliated universityRoyal College of Surgeons in Ireland
Dublin City University
PatronBartholomew Mosse
Services
SpecialityMaternity hospital
History
Former name(s)Dublin Lying-In Hospital
Opened1745; 279 years ago (1745)
Links
ListsHospitals in the Republic of Ireland

History

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The Rotunda Hospital in 1780
 
Back of the hospital, showing tennis courts. ca. 1890s
 
Sign on the Rotunda hospital, with a neon light image of a stork

The hospital was founded by Bartholomew Mosse, a surgeon and midwife who was appalled at the conditions that pregnant women had to endure, in George's Lane in March 1745.[4] It was granted by royal charter on 2 December 1756 by King George II.[5] Lying-in is an archaic term for childbirth (referring to the month-long bed rest prescribed for postpartum confinement).[6] The venture was very successful and Mosse raised money through concerts, exhibitions and even a lottery to establish larger premises.[7]

The hospital moved to its current premises in 1757, designed by Richard Cassels,[8] where it became known as "The New Lying-In Hospital".[9] The Church of Ireland Chapel was opened in 1762.[10] Open to the public, it provided a healthy income to the hospital annually, Dr. Mosse successfully encouraging wealthy Protestant Dubliners to attend service there.[11][12]

Records indicate that around 1781, "when the hospital was imperfectly ventilated, every sixth child died within nine days after birth, of convulsive disease; and that after means of thorough ventilation had been adopted, the mortality of infants, within the same, in five succeeding years, was reduced to one in twenty".[13] This issue was not limited to the Lying-In-Hospital. In that era, ventilation improvement was a general issue in patient care,[14] along with other issues of sanitation and hygiene, and the conditions in which surgeons such as Robert Liston in Britain and elsewhere, had to operate.[15][16] Florence Nightingale famously worked on the design of safe and healthy hospitals.[14]

The first caesarean section in Ireland was undertaken at the hospital in 1889.[17]

By 1993, the hospital was still functioning as a maternity hospital.[18]

Rotunda

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The eponymous Rotunda, designed by James Ensor,[8] was completed just in time for a reception hosted by James FitzGerald, Marquess of Kildare in October 1767.[19] The extensive Rotunda Rooms, designed by Richard Johnston and built adjacent to the rotunda, were completed in 1791.[20] By the early 19th century the hospital had become known as the Rotunda Hospital, after its most prominent architectural feature.[21] The Rotunda became a theatre, where the Irish Volunteers' first public meeting was held in 1913, and later housed the Ambassador Cinema. The Rotunda Rooms now house the Gate Theatre.[22]

Architecture

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Patrick Wyse Jackson, curator of the Geological Museum in Trinity College, assessed the building in 1993 as part of his book "The Building Stones of Dublin: A Walking Guide" with the following remarks:

"The walls of the current building dating from 1757 are faced with Leinster granite and Kilgobbin granite... The former building was executed in Portland stone and Leinster granite, to which a sculptured frieze of ox heads and other panels were added. These are interesting as they are made of Coade stone, a fashionable artificial stone used widely in the late 1700s."[18] The Rotunda or "round room", and the buildings now occupied by the Gate Theatre were later additions.[18]

Services

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The Rotunda Hospital, as both a maternity hospital and also as a training centre (affiliated with Trinity College Dublin)[23] is notable for having provided continuous service to mothers and babies since inception, making it the oldest continuously operating maternity hospital in the world.[24] It is estimated that over 300,000 babies have been born there.[25]

Criticism

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In 2000 the Rotunda Hospital was one of two Dublin maternity hospitals found to have illegally retained organ tissue from babies without parental consent. The tissue removed in post-mortem examinations was retained for some years. The Rotunda hospital admitted that permission should have been sought for this process to be allowed to take place.[26]

A medical negligence award was approved in 2020 for a young boy who developed cerebral palsy as a result of complications with his delivery at the hospital in 2004.[27]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ "Ospidéal an Rotunda". téarma.ie. Retrieved 15 May 2020.
  2. ^ "S.I. No. 329/1999 - Freedom of Information Act, 1997 (Prescribed Bodies) Regulations, 1999". electronic Irish Statute Book. First Schedule, No.30. Retrieved 15 May 2020.
  3. ^ "Six hospital groups 'most fundamental reform in decades'". Irish Medical Times. 14 May 2013. Retrieved 27 May 2019.
  4. ^ Kirkpatrick, p. 7
  5. ^ "The Rotunda Charter Booklet" (PDF). Retrieved 6 January 2020.
  6. ^ Slemons, J. Morris (1912). "The Prospective Mother: A Handbook for Women During Pregnancy".
  7. ^ Kirkpatrick, p. 25
  8. ^ a b "Rotunda Hospital". Architecture Of Dublin. Archiseek.com. Archived from the original on 23 July 2008. Retrieved 11 June 2008.
  9. ^ Kirkpatrick, p. 35
  10. ^ "Chronological History of the Rotunda Hospital" (PDF). Retrieved 6 January 2020.
  11. ^ "History: Heroes: Bartholomew Mosse". www.turtlebunbury.com. Retrieved 6 January 2020.
  12. ^ "Bartholomew Mosse and the Rotunda". Newstalk. Retrieved 6 January 2020.
  13. ^ Claridge, Capt. R.T. (1843). Hydropathy; or The Cold Water Cure, as practiced by Vincent Priessnitz, at Graefenberg, Silesia, Austria (8th ed.). London: James Madden and Co. p. 37. Retrieved 29 October 2009. Full text at Internet Archive (archive.org).
  14. ^ a b Nightingale, Florence (1860). Notes on Nursing: What it is and what it is not. Boston: William Carter. Retrieved 24 October 2009. Full text at Internet Archive (archive.org)
  15. ^ Gordon, Richard (1983). "Disastrous Motherhood: Tales from the Vienna Wards". Great Medical Disasters. London: Hutchinson & Co. pp. 43–46. p.43
  16. ^ Holmes, O.W. (March 1842). "On the contagiousness of puerperal fever". New England Quarterly Journal of Medicine. i: 503–30. in Gordon, R. (1983), p.147.
  17. ^ "New RTE series delves behind the scenes at world's longest running maternity hospital in Dublin". Irish Post. 13 September 2018. Retrieved 6 May 2019.
  18. ^ a b c Wyse Jackson 1993, p. 45.
  19. ^ Kirkpatrick, p. 68
  20. ^ Kirkpatrick, p. 104
  21. ^ Kirkpatrick, p. 198
  22. ^ "90 Years of The Gate Theatre | Dublin City Council". www.dublincity.ie. Retrieved 28 June 2018.
  23. ^ "Trinity College Campus Maps:-Rotunda". University Of Dublin, Trinity College. Retrieved 11 June 2008.
  24. ^ "The Rotunda: Behind the scenes at the world's oldest maternity hospital". Irish Times. 14 September 2018. Retrieved 6 May 2019.
  25. ^ "Patient Information Booklet" (PDF). Rotunda Hospital. Archived from the original (PDF) on 21 July 2011. Retrieved 6 May 2019.
  26. ^ "Rotunda and Holles Street kept babies' organ tissue". 29 February 2000.
  27. ^ "Boy gets €3m over birth brain injuries". Irish Examiner. 12 February 2016. Retrieved 30 October 2020.

Sources

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