London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972
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Hints from the Health Department. Leaflet from the archive of the Society of Medical Officers of Health. Credit: Wellcome Collection, London
London County Council 1911
[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for London County Council]
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160
Annual Report of the London County Council, 1911.
right and left thumbs respectively, and all cases in which one was higher than the other were put aside
for further examination, when the spines of the vertebrae were marked out with a dermograph,
and a plumb line fixed to a rod was dropped from the cervical vertebra ; deviations were
then recorded by a calliper gauge. Unfortunately a series at different ages could not be obtained, as
children are only examined at certain age groups now. Those bom in 1899 and 1903 were taken, and
3 39 per cent. of 383 girls born in 1903, and 6 25 per cent. of 240 born in 1899 were noted with scoliosis.
The poorer the school the more curvature seemed to prevail. The cases were all mild except two, and
a considerable proportion of them came under remedial treatment arranged by the Woolwich Branch
of the Invalid Children's Association.
Miss Dobbie, who has special knowledge of these defects, having spent much time both in the surgical diagnosis and treatment of orthopaedic cases and in the application of exercises to them, has made very careful notes on a considerable number of unselected children of the 8—9 and 12—13 year old groups, born in 1899 and 1903. She has analysed her records as follows:—
| Age group | Sex | Numbera examined | Normal spines | Kyphosis | Lordosis | Kyplio-lordosis | Lateral curves | Knockknees | Tendency to flat " feet | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Slight | Definite | Slight | Definite | ||||||||
| 8-9 | B | 412 | 213 | 16 | 4 | 7 | 182 | 5 | 121 | 82 | 144 |
| per cent. | 5169 | 3.88 | .97 | 169 | 4417 | 1.21 | 29.36 | 19.90 | 34.95 | ||
| G | 384 | 169 | 20 | 2 | 13 | 191 | 5 | 110 | 67 | 91 | |
| per cent. | 4401 | 5.20 | .52 | 3.35 | 49.73 | 1.30 | 28.64 | 17.44 | 23.43 | ||
| 12-13 ... | B | 363 | 129 | 24 | 2 | 3 | 215 | 7 | 98 | 42 | 140 |
| per cent. | 35.53 | 6.61 | .55 | .82 | 59.22 | 1.92 | 26.99 | 11.57 | 38.56 | ||
| G | 326 | 100 | 24 | 4 | 12 | 202 | 9 | 91 | 56 | 102 | |
| per cent. | 30.67 | 7.36 | 1.22 | 3.68 | 61.96 | 2.69 | 27.91 | 17.17 | 31.28 | ||
Miss Dobbie also compared the older (12—13) group of children with reference to their vision and obtained the following results, which do not seem to support the idea that spinal and oculai conditions are related :—
| Spinal condition. | Sex. | Numbers. | Vision Normal | Vision fair. | Vision bad. | Vision. | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | 6 | 6 | 6 | 6 | Unequal | |||
| 6 | 9 | 12 | 18 | 24 | ||||
| Normal spines | B. | 129 | 62 | 31 | 10 | 1 | 2 | 23 |
| per cent. | 48.1 | 24.0 | 7.7 | .7 | 1.5 | 17.8 | ||
| G. | 100 | 32 | 26 | 12 | 8 | 1 | 21 | |
| per cent. | 32.0 | 26.0 | 12.0 | 8.0 | 1.0 | 21.0 | ||
| Lateral curves | B. | 222 | 137 | 34 | 7 | 6 | 2 | 36 |
| per cent. | 61.7 | 15.3 | 3.15 | 2.7 | .9 | 16.2 | ||
| G. | 211 | 96 | 68 | 17 | 7 | 1 | 22 | |
| per cent. | 45.5 | 32.2 | 8.0 | 3.3 | .5 | 10.4 | ||
| Kyphosis lordosis, etc. | B. | 29 | 20 | 4 | - | 1 | 1 | 3 |
| • ' 1 | per cent. | 69.0 | 13.8 | - | 3.5 | 3.5 | 10.3 | |
| G. | 40 | 17 | 11 | 7 | 3 | 1 | 1 | |
| per cent. | 42.5 | 27.5 | 17.5 | 7.5 | 2.5 | 2.5 | ||
Whilst these results from the primary schools are slight, they indicate that curvatures are not
very serious, and they are in concordance with the more extensive investigation in secondary schools
reported on last year.
' School Planning and Apparatus.
Lighting.
The reports on natural lighting of schools tabulated hitherto have dealt with schools as units
and merely given the conditions of lighting as a general statement, good, fair or bad, according to the
impression on the observer.
During the years 1906-8 the returns showed for about 1,000 schools 68.5 per cent. returned as good,
9.4 per cent. fair, and 22 0 per cent. as bad in respect to lighting. With the modernising wave which
swept over the schools about that time, many bad schools were either closed or structurally improved.
The reports of some 1,300 schools during 1909-10 showed the natural lighting as good in 76.7, fair in
215, and bad in T8 per cent. The 22 per cent. badly lighted had now mostly passed over to fair or
good. During the last period the artificial lighting cursorily recorded in a similar way showed 92.9 per
cent. good,. 5.6 per cent. fair, and 14 per cent. bad. These figures can only be taken as rough impressions