St. Camillus, entirely without means of existence and from his early youth suffering from an incurable wound in his foot, experienced the horrors of the Roman hospitals in the sixteenth century in which the nursing and other staff were drawn from the dregs of the population. He effected a great change for the better, for not content with making himself a slave of the sick and diseased he established for them a congregation of Clerks Regular pledged to this work, even when it involved those suffering from the plague, and whatever their state of life or disease. St. Camillus died in Rome on July 14, 1614. Leo XIII proclaimed him patron of hospitals and the sick and Pius XI declared him the protector of all nuns who care for the sick. He name has been inserted in the Litany for the dying.