Hospital Sayings and Quotes

Below you will find our collection of inspirational, wise, and humorous old hospital quotes, hospital sayings, and hospital proverbs, collected over the years from a variety of sources.

Hospitals are only an intermediate stage of civilization, never intended at all even to take in the whole sick population. Florence Nightingale
The hospital industry to this day works its tail off to do the right thing. Rick Scott
The hospital that feeds you refined sugar, white bread, canned soup, bouillon cubes, and frozen vegetables should be closed by the health department as a menace to the public health. David Reuben
Hospital life--with its byzantine array of moving parts layered atop the unpredictable rhythms of illness is a permanent state of flux. Danielle Ofri
A hospital alone shows what war is. Erich Maria Remarque
In a hospital they throw you out into the street before you are half cured, but in a nursing home they don't let you out till you are dead. George Bernard Shaw
Getting out of the hospital is a lot like resigning from a book club. You're not out of it until the computer says you're out of it. Erma Bombeck
Hospitals are great places, and you can learn from them, but you don't necessarily need to go in anytime you get the sniffles. And maybe you shouldn't treat pregnancy as a disease. Sarah Wayne Callies
Healing in a matter of time, but it is sometimes also a matter of opportunity. Hippocrates
The hospital bulked darkly in the darkness. William T. Vollmann
In a hospital, half of the patients get better food than at home. Gerhard Kocher
A hospital should also have a recovery room adjoining the cashier's office. Francis Owalsh
The most frequent lie in a hospital: it won't hurt. Gerhard Kocher
In the feeding of hospital patients, more attention should be given to providing tasty and attractive meals, and less to the nutritive quality of the food. Frederick J. Stare
Hospitals. The only place where the word “Positive” means a bad thing. Anonymous
How many desolate creatures on the earth have learnt the simple dues of fellowship and social comfort, in a hospital. Elizabeth Barrett Browning
This life is a hospital in which every patient is possessed with a desire to change his bed. Charles Baudelaire
A hospital bed is a parked taxi with the meter running. Groucho Marx
A hospital may spend several million dollars separating a pair of conjoined twins even though that separation is likely to leave them worse off. Alice Dreger
This hospital, like every other, is a hole in the universe through which holiness issues in blasts. It blows both ways, in and out of time. Annie Dillard
Nurses may not be angels, but they are the next best thing. Anonymous
Great hospitals do two things. They look after patients, and they teach young doctors. We look after clients, and we teach young advertising people. David Ogilvy
Strength and strength's will are the supreme ethic. All else are dreams from hospital beds, the sly, crawling goodness of sneaking souls. Elbert Hubbard
A hospital is no place to be sick. Samuel Goldwyn
Hospitals are a little like the beach. The next wave comes in, and the footprints of your pain and suffering, your delivery and recovery, are obliterated. Anna Quindlen
Hospitals must provide emergency treatment to all who walk through the door, regardless of their citizenship status or ability to pay. Gary Miller
The hospital room was as cold as dead skin, the hallway crowded with lost souls and reeking of illness. Raquel Cepeda
In hospital, people should be able to have time to themselves. Zaha Hadid
Hospitals are about healing. Irwin Redlener
A hospital is a good place to set various dilemmas. Aminatta Forna
Too often, hospital staff are incented by management to get work done without worrying about care, and clinicians are too often not even trained to think about care. Dave deBronkart
The hospital is the antechamber to the tomb. George Orwell
Cure sometimes, treat often, comfort always. Hippocrates
And it's hard to hate someone once you understand them. Lucy Christopher
Wherever the art of medicine is loved, there is also a love of humanity. Hippocrates
One kind word can warm three winter months. Japanese Proverb
They may forget your name, but they will never forget how you made them feel. Maya Angelou
You treat a disease, you win, you lose. You treat a person, I guarantee you, you’ll win, no matter what the outcome. Patch Adams
Nurses: one of the few blessings of being ill. Sara Moss-Wolfe
After all we are merely the servants of the public, in spite of our M.D.’s and our hospital appointments. Sir Henry Howarth Bashford
After two days in the hospital, I took a turn for the nurse. W.C. Fields
America is a constipated nation.... If you pass small stools, you have to have large hospitals. Denis Burkitt
First need in the reform of hospital management? That’s easy! The death of all dietitians, and the resurrection of a French chef. Martin H. Fischer
If a patient is poor he is committed to a public hospital as a 'psychotic.' If he can afford a sanitarium, the diagnosis is 'neurasthenia.' If he is wealthy enough to be in his own home under the constant watch of nurses and physicians, he is simply 'an indisposed eccentric. Pierre(-Marie-Félix) Janet
In the sick room, ten cents’ worth of human understanding equals ten dollars' worth of medical science. Martin H. Fischer
The hospital is the only proper College in which to rear a true disciple of Aesculapius. John Abernethy
The sooner patients can be removed from the depressing influence of general hospital life the more rapid their convalescence. Charles Mayo
The trained nurse has given nursing the human, or shall we say, the divine touch, and made the hospital desirable for patients with serious ailments regardless of their home advantages. Charles Mayo
The power of community to create health is far greater than any physician, clinic or hospital. Mark Hyman
A trip to the hospital is always a descent into the macabre. I have never trusted a place with shiny floors. Terry Tempest Williams
Hospitals, like airports and supermarkets, only pretend to be open nights and weekends. Molly Haskell
We go by the major vote, and if the majority are insane, the sane must go to the hospital. Horace Mann
Even top caliber hospitals cannot escape medical mistakes that sometimes result in irreparable damage to patients. Carl Levin
When a nation is over-reliant on one or two commodities like oil or precious minerals, corrupt government ministers and their dodgy associates hoard profits and taxes instead of properly allocating them to schools and hospitals. Bono
We need to bridge the gap between the medical libraries and the hospital rooms; take the information out there already, add to it, focus it, harness it - and bring it to the patient who was just diagnosed today. Bruce Vento
In hospitals there is no time off for good behavior. Josephine Tey
A church is a hospital for sinners, not a museum for saints. Pauline Phillips
Going to hospital is rather like going to an alien planet. Quentin Blake