The care of seriously ill patients in hospital and general practice.

There is little information about the size of the reservoir of seriously ill patients from which patients admitted to medical beds in hospital are drawn, and indeed, the impression is widely held that all serinously ill patients are cared for in hospital. Taylor (1960) pointed out that any planning of the future of the hospital services must take account not only of trends in population structure and treatment but also the total morbidity experienced by the population. A leading article in the same publication also stressed the need for annual morbidity rates if any real assessment of future needs was to be achieved.