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26
METHODS EMPLOYED FOR SECURING TREATMENT OF
THE DEFECTS.
Where the parents themselves attended the medical inspection
of their children, the Assistant School Medical Officers personally
instructed the parents as to the need for having the defects discovered
attended to. This is not the least valuable result of the
attendance of the parents at the schools; the interview with the
Medical Officer is an occasion on which the parent can be impressed
with the importance of following the instructions which
the condition of the child's health dictates.
Should the examining Medical Officer consider it desirable
that the School Nurse should visit the house of the child, or in any
case should he deem the case one calling for the exclusion of the
child from school, intimation of the name, age and address of the
child, the disease and period of exclusion, is made to the School
Medical Officer on a small card known as the Health Visitor's
Card. All such cases are made the subject of domiciliary visits
by the Lady Health Visitors, the importance of securing medical
treatment of the condition is urged where necessary upon the
parents, and supervision of the extent to which the treatment
recommended by the doctor or hospital is carried out, is exercised
until the child is well enough to return to school.
The following table summarises the main results of this work
during the year. It conveys but a poor impression, however, of
the nature and character of the work. The administrative
measures alone arising out of this work involve an immense
amount of time and trouble.
Each case is the subject of systematic record and report.
Many of the cases involve frequent and continued re-visiting, and
are the occasion of a great variety of communications with
numerous institutions and agencies, the more frequently recurring
of which have been reduced to suitable forms issued from the
office of the Health Department.