Reefton Hospital

[2] The community had begun efforts to improve the provision of health care in 1871 by forming a Sickness and Medical Aid Society.

[1] Later in 1872 Bulmer was charged with assaulting a fellow doctor, Joseph Currie, and was fined twenty shillings.

[1][3] In the following months Bulmer appeared in court several times on various matters including his suing a midwife over payment for his services.

[6] One ward was funded by David Ziman, a local resident and head of the Consolidated Gold Mine Group.

Records of the hospital show that patients were mainly miners of young to middle age who were treated for either injuries received in accidents or for phthisis (tuberculosis) caused by mining.

[2][3] In his evidence to the 1912 New Zealand Royal Commission on Mines Dr William Conlon noted that between 1899 and 1909 55 men on the Reefton gold field had died of miners' disease.

[2] The Nurses Home building in Shiel St was opened in September 1949 by the Minister of Health, Mabel Howard.