This elegantly produced book outlines the history of the Mater since it opened as a 28 bedded hospital on 1 November 1883.
In 1899 it expanded to 150 beds. Funding was provided by charitable donations, including a Grand 6 day Bazaar in the Ulster Hall. Later the Working Men's Maintenance Committee contributed generously. In 1948 the ‘Young Philanthropists’ had the brilliant idea of setting up a football pools company, and this raised many millions over the succeeding years.
At the inception of the NHS in 1948 the Unionist Government failed to offer guarantees similar to those given to voluntary hospitals in the rest of the UK, and the Mater had to survive independently until 1972.
The book reflects the Mater as part of its society. In 1886 it treated hundreds of casualties from the Home Rule riots in which over 50 were killed (la plus ca change!). In 1922 government forces fired at the hospital using a machine gun from Crumlin Road Prison. During the blitz there was bomb damage to the Nurses’ Home. In 1976 Sinn Fein's Vice-President Maire Drumm was murdered in her hospital bed.
Staff were not immune from the violence. In 1972 consultant ophthalmologist Peter Gormley's car was ambushed. He was shot and his son Rory was killed. The son of consultant surgeon Paddy Lane was also murdered in 1972.
Astonishingly, consultants were not paid until the 1950s! (They were expected to survive on private practice). After this they received an ‘honorarium’, but this was much less than the salary of NHS Consultants.
First recognised for medical student and nurse training in 1899 the Mater has a long and proud tradition of teaching which continues to this day. Of note, in the 1920s nurses had to be 5’ 2” in height and 8 stones in weight!
The first Mater doctor was (later Sir) Alex Dempsey. The hospital appointed the first full time anaesthetist in Ireland, Dr Claire McGucken, in 1923. In 1952 Dr Pearse O'Malley opened the first inpatient psychiatric unit in a general hospital in Ireland. In 1985 the Mater became the first hospital to offer day surgery for cataracts.
Throughout the ‘Troubles’ the Mater, which has long been the hospital of choice for the people of the Shankill Road as well as North Belfast and further afield, treated a remarkable number of patients and saved very many lives. The Emergency Department, despite several incidents when riot police had to be called, was a true oasis of healing, situated in an area which witnessed dreadful violence for over three decades.
This book, which is well laid out and generously illustrated with a range of photographs old and new is a fitting tribute to one of Northern Ireland's finest public institutions.
Dr Philip McGarry Consultant Psychiatrist