Records of STANDISH HOSPITAL

ADMINISTRATIVE RECORDS LESS THAN 30 YEARS OLD AND MEDICAL AND STAFFING RECORDS LESS THAN 100 YEARS OLD MAY NOT BE CONSULTED WITHOUT THE WRITTEN PERMISSION OF THE DEPOSITOR

(Acc: 4508)

Deposited by Gloucester District Health Authority, 24 August 1982

The Gloucestershire Joint (City and County) Committee for Tuberculosis was established in 1912 to combat the spread of the disease and make available sanatoria where sufferers could recuperate. Beds were initially made available at the Cotswold Sanatorium, Cranham and other local hospitals (especially Over and Cheltenham General) but in 1920 the Committee purchased Standish House from Lord Sherborne and in 1922, opened it as a tuberculosis hospital. Standish House, which was built in 1830 on an eminence exposed to the prevailing winds was ideally suited for the forms of treatment used for TB at that date, and had already been adapted by the Red Cross for use as a hospital during the First World War. Because a high proportion of TB sufferers were children, a school was attached to the hospital from its inception, and the records of this have been separately listed (SM 305/2, S 305/2). After 1948, the hospital was taken over by the Gloucester, Stroud and the Forest Hospital Management Committee, and became a general hospital. It has since been considerably enlarged, and now caters largely for geriatric and pulmonary patients (1983).