The current exhibition at St Mary’s Hospital is a visual display of photographs, engravings and watercolours from the heritage collections of individuals and public collections on the Island, with explanatory text panels, about the founding of the “Royal National Hospital for Diseases of the Chest” at Ventnor.
The exhibition at St Mary’s Full Circle Exhibition space gives a picture of what life was like for patients at the hospital and the treatment they received. The exhibition is free and is open 09:00-21:00 daily until January 2016.
The Victorian Hospital at Ventnor was a pioneer in the treatment of Tuberculosis (TB) in the UK introducing both the ‘sanatorium’ regime and innovative architectural and hospital environmental design.
The pharmacist, Gordon Chubb, has decoded the homeopathic treatments patients received and the local historian, Robin McInnes, has allowed display of his collection of 19th and early 20th century photographs taken of patients and hospital life.
Guy Eades, Healing Art Director for the IoW NHS Trust has compiled a short history of the hospital which can be read at www.iow.nhs.uk/healingarts.
Permission to display images and assistance has also come from the Isle of Wight Council’s heritage collection and Archive office, and Carisbrooke Castle Museum.
The Royal Hospital at Ventnor was built at the height of the Island’s reputation, and Ventnor’s in particular, as the centre for fashionable society to live or visit, and also at the time when medicine and the sciences were making huge advances in both knowledge and practice. Combine the 96 year history and exhibition of Ventnor’s Royal Hospital makes a fascinating and absorbing story.
