Lincoln Hospital: The Decline of Health Care, A 1971 Radio Documentary
The old Lincoln Hospital
In April of 2007, our journal Social Medicine, published the audio tapes of a 1971 Pacifica Radio documentary about the conditions at Lincoln Hospital, one of the largest public hospitals in the Bronx. Lincoln had been briefly occupied by the community in 1970 and this takeover was the subject of several articles in the journal.
Unfortunately, technical problems broke the link to this audio. Thanks to help from Sebastian Pais Iriart this has now been corrected and the audio file is available at this link in mp3 format.
The audio tape was accompanied by an article. Here are the first few paragraphs:
“Lincoln Hospital: the decline of health care” was broadcast on WBAI radio in New York City on April 22, 1971, roughly a year after the community takeover of Lincoln Hospital (see Fitzhugh Mullan’s article “Seize the Hospital to Serve the People” on page 98 of this journal). The documentary provides an opportunity to
hear the voices of some of the people at the center of the struggle to reform – or revolutionize – one of New York City’s most dysfunctional hospitals.
These voices include physicians (Drs. Martin Stein, Helen Rodriguez-Trias, Lewis Fraad, Arnold Einhorn, and Fitzhugh Mullan), a community activist (Cleo Silvers), administrators (Antero Lacot, Edmund Rothschild, Stanley Bergin) and several patients.
Much of the documentary focuses on the health issues of the Bronx and the inadequacies of the hospital. Dr. Lewis Fraad notes, for example: “Lincoln Hospital is full of lead poisoning. And until recently, we have seen children get lead poisoning while hospitalized at Lincoln Hospital.” Patients recount long waits in the Emergency Room. [...to read the rest of the article, click here]
What makes this documentary particularly interesting is the extensive discussion/debate regarding woker and community control of the hospital. This topic is essentially absent from the current corporate-dominated discussion of hospital management.
We hope in January 2009 to publish a video interview with Cleo Silvers, one of the key activists at Lincoln.
posted by Matt Anderson
I was born in “The Old Lincoln Hospital” back in 1966. I remember when it was closed down in 1975 (or 1976?) I used to sneak in and check out all the weird stuff that was left behind. Fetuses in jars filled with a clear liquid, medical instruments of all shapes and sizes, cabinets filled with documents, and, I just remembered, Mercury. Yeah, Liquid Mercury! I actually would pour it out from something (I really can’t remember what) onto my hands and play with it. It was fascinating to me. But isn’t that extremely dangerous? I have some crazy memories of that day. I was even chased by some bums and ran like hell with terror. Anyway, I hope somebody reads this and leaves some comments.
Yes, playing with liquid Mercury is very dangerous!
Lincoln has been (and is) such an important part of the life of the South Bronx, but there seems to be very little written about its history. Since posting this material about the hospital I’ve had any number of co-workers and patients tell me fascinating stories about the old hospital and their experiences there. It is sad that no-one is capturing this rich oral history.
One of my fascinations in medical school were the display cases of strange bottles, strange contents, and strange instruments.
Best, Matt Anderson
I was a patient of one of the 2 pediatric wards many times as an asthmatic child and I also remember sneaking out out carrying my IV bottle with my best friend and snooping around. We also came accross a room filled with jars with strange looking things inside them. You could roam around pretty much without being caught as in hindsight it seem they were very understaffed. But I do remember the nurses being very good to me
I remember the old Lincoln Hospital vaguely. I was born in the old St. Francis Hospital on Union Ave & 156 ST in 1964. I wish there was a way to look back at records or archives from these hospitals. Especially from Lincoln because of a personal interest. There was a history of alleged “baby died” cases back in those days dating back to the beginning of the 20th century. Many black market babies were stolen, switched and/or sold at the expense of naive, unsuspecting mothers. This happened to my mom back in April of 1959 at Lincoln Hospital. She was heavily sedated after giving birth to a baby girl, her third at the time. When she regained alertness, hospital officials told her that her baby was stillborn. My mom felt that her baby was born alive and healthy. Unfortunately, my Dad was working at the time. My mom remembers that day as if it were yesterday. They had only arrived in NY in 1955 from Puerto Rico, so there a language barrier and they didn’t know their rights at the time. They weren’t shown the stillborn nor was a death certificate or record ever given to them of the occurence. With heavy hearts, they left the hospital accepting only what was told to them. My Parents to this day, maintain that their daughter is out there somewhere, maybe aware or unaware of what happened over 50 years old. She would be 51 years old this month. Now my parents are in their mid 70s with many health issues. They hold out hope that one day they will meet their long lost daughter. I’m sure that we are not the only family that this has happened to at Lincoln Hospital. I feel that my parents were the victims of a black market ring that was widespread through out the U.S. I guess this is one of those “long lost love” cases for “Unsolved Mysteries”. thanks, MC
Dear Mel, Thank you for sharing this moving story. Even if your suspicions are incorrect, they are eloquent testimony to the way patients, particularly poor patients, were treated in some NYC public hospitals. No one should feel that they are just so much “clinical material” to be used by the doctors. This was undoubtedly one of the reasons that the Lincoln takeover involved demands for community control over the hospital. Matt Anderson, MD