London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972

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Hornsey 1957

[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Hornsey, Borough of]

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referred to the chest clinic during the year were all found to be free from
tuberculosis. Routine investigation of the family of one child referred to
the chest clinic disclosed that the mother had tuberculous infiltration of
the upper zone of the left lung, and she was admitted to hospital for
investigation and treatment. The accompanying table shows the figures
for 1957 compared with those of 1956.

This table relates to Hornsey only.

19571956
Parents approached1,128%1,025%
Parents accepting94783.974172.3
Mantoux positive9111.8679.8
% Strong positives, Reaction greater than 20 mms in diameter61.644.8
% Weak positives38.455.2
Mantoux negative70285.658785.9
Total vaccinated69161.3 of children in group approached58657.2 of children in group approached

School Dental Service
I am indebted to Mr. V. Sainty, Area Dental Officer, for the following
report:—
"During the year there was a reduction in staff owing to the appointment
of Miss W. M. Hunt to the post of Area Dental Officer in Willesden.
Miss Hunt left on the 15th June and it was not possible to fill the vacancy
until the 1st January 1958, thus staff for the second half of the year was:
Area Dental Officer, five full-time and two part-time dental officers and
one part-time orthodontist. The two part-time dental officers together
worked a total of nine sessions per week; in addition to this we had the
services of one more part-time dental officer for five sessions per week
for the last eight weeks of the year.
The two Boroughs have been fortunate in recent years in still having
a good proportion of full-time dental officers.
Owing to lack of incentive to take up full-time service as a career,
coupled with the more advantageous remuneration for sessional work,
the trend has been generally for a greater reliance to have to be placed
on the part-timer to provide adequate staff and then often not very
successfully. In this connection it is significant that it is almost twenty
years since an application for a full-time post was received from a male
British dental surgeon for employment here apart from one case of reemployment
after retirement on pension.
Yet in the years before the war a post as School Dental Officer was
able, in many areas, to compete favourably with one in private practice,
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