University Of Victoria - Health Services

The task of writing an article describing the Health Service 30 years ago did not require me to dig into the archives or to interview long retired staff members. I merely sat down and reminisced. I recall the Fall of 1960 when I joined the Health Service located in the Young Building at what is now Camosun College. Our main function was performing medicals on the First Year Students. The rest of the year the Health Service consisted of one nurse, Mirium Oliver, with myself attending for a few hours on Saturdays... What a far cry from our present 35,000 patient visits each year.
If you complained of a sore throat back then you would not get a prescription for an antibiotic pill but would receive a shot Penicillin, administered by a needle that may or may not be sharp depending on when it was last sharpened. There were no disposables then, each needle was reused indefinitely (after sterilizing of course.)
When the campus migrated from Lansdowne to the Old Army Camp in Gordon Head in 1966 we were located in a small house situated where the Graduate Student Building now stands. This was a major upgrading of our facilities though it still left much to be desired. In 1969 we moved to our current building in Parking Lot #5. This was an old house originally situated on Sinclair and Haro Roads. The house was cut in half, and moved across the road onto new foundations and the interior redesigned for our use.
Issues faced 30 years ago are now part of regular practice. One of the first issues was, should Health Services do "pap" tests? We decided yes, and managed to obtain an ancient gyne table from I don't know where. It was so unstable that Harry Barber, from the carpentry shop, attached it to the wall to keep it from collapsing.