Filling the Gap between Metropoles and Peripheries: Insights about Hospital Standardization from the British Columbia Hospital Association Conferences, 1918-30

Abstract

In this study, we examine British Columbia's Hospital Association conference records (1918-31) to understand how place, gender, and profession shaped debates about hospital standardization during the interwar period. The conference records reveal that hospital standardization was conceptualized as the conformity of smaller, peripheral hospitals to larger metropolitan ones. Arguments about how to best address the gaps in small hospitals were often directed to elite nursing leaders, who suggested improved nursing education as a solution. Hospital affiliation was recommended to ensure adequate training for rural nurses by moving trainee nurses from rural to urban hospitals during the last year of their education. Yet the way that affiliation was conceived was more aligned with the professional goals of the nursing elite, rather than the needs of rank-and-file nurses in small hospitals. These ideas ultimately worked to support the goals of standardization, but obscured the divergent needs of small community hospitals.

Keywords: British Columbia; Canadian history; Colombie-Britannique; histoire de la médecine; histoire des hôpitaux; histoire des soins infirmiers; histoire du Canada; hospital history; hospital standardization; hôpital rural; medical history; normalisation des hôpitaux; nursing history; rural health; rural hospital; santé rurale.