Changing patterns in paediatric surgical care.

The increased use of day facilities for children undergoing surgery and the provision of a paediatric home nursing team has resulted in a change in overall care of surgical children in hospital in Southampton. The ratio of day patients to inpatients has fallen from 1 : 2 in 1970 to 1 : 1 in 1976 and the early discharge of inpatients has resulted in a fall in the average inpatient stay of 6.6 days in 1970 to 5.7 days in 1976. I am sure that Alex Simpson Smith, who experienced a traumatic hospital admission at the age of 3 years and who always had the interests of children at heart, would have appreciated and actively encouraged these changes in hospital practice if he had been alive and with us today.