Establishing a State-Owned Tuberculosis System in Kentucky
The first tuberculosis hospitals in the Commonwealth of Kentucky were county-operated facilities that served the local populations of each county. The first tuberculosis sanatorium in Kentucky was Hazelwood Sanatorium and accepted its first patients in 1907.
The Kentucky Tuberculosis Sanatoria Commission sent an architect to travel throughout Kentucky in hopes of finding locations to build five state tuberculosis hospitals in the local communities. It was decided, then, that District One would be located in Madisonville, District Two would be located in Louisville, District Three would be located in Paris, District Four would be located in Ashland, District Five would be located in London, and District Six would be located in Glasgow. New hospitals would be built for each of the districts with the exception of District Two in Louisville where Hazelwood was already located.
Construction of the new tuberculosis hospitals began in 1946 and completed in 1950. Interestingly, all five of the new hospitals had nearly identical designs and layouts. The layouts were a standard five-building layout including the main hospital, residence of the director, residence for staff, a nurses’ residence, and a boiler and laundry house. The buildings were designed by architects John T. Gillig and Fred J. Harsten of Lexington and J. T. Wilson of Louisville was the construction engineering firm. Each hospital was to accommodate at least 100 patients with Hazelwood housing 250 patients and 750 additional beds in city and county tuberculosis sanatoria throughout Kentucky. Over time, however, drug therapy began making its mark on the fight against tuberculosis and by the mid-1970s, the few remaining tuberculosis hospitals were primarily treating chronic respiratory diseases. The remaining buildings were retrofitted for various uses ranging from long-term care to state governmental offices.
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