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Ministry of Health Regulations would no doubt enjoin the Medical Officer
of Health to make such enquiries and take such steps as may be necessary or
desirable for investigating the source of the disease, for removing conditions
harmful to the patient and arranging for appropriate treatment. Compulsory
notification would draw attention to this disease as a disease of childhood. Visitation
to the home following notification would also impress upon the parents the
necessity for proper care and attention of the patient and of not accepting the
poor state of health of the child as inevitable. Although child rheumatism is
not a common malady, it is. nevertheless, a serious disease when it occurs in
young children, in view of the high mortality rate following generally a long period
of impaired vitality of the sufferer.
No special accommodation in the building is indicated for this Clinic
as the waiting hall and medical consulting rooms on the ground floor could be
used for this purpose. The electro-medical department will be principally concerned
in the treatment arrangements of this Clinic, and it is, therefore, not anticipated
that any equipment charges will be incurred.
The work of this Clinic should be entrusted to a physician who has specialised
in rheumatic diseases ; the appointment to be on a sessional basis as the circumstances
of the service require. No other appointments are, however, indicated
for the time being.
Infant Welfare Centre.
The site for the proposed Health Centre is situated in the Addington
Ward of the Borough, in which Ward there is an Infant Welfare Centre conducted
by the Cambridge House and Kempshead Hall Centres Authorities, from an
adapted dwelling house No. 6, Addington Square.
For many years past, I have been dissatisfied with the accommodation
at this Infant Welfare Centre, and the unsuitabilitv of the premises generally
for the purposes for which they are used; for the same reason I have not hesitated
to express my opinion with regard to the Municipal Infant Welfare Centre at
140, Camberwell Road, an opinion which has been upheld by the Inspecting
Officers of the Ministry of Health.
It would seem that the proposed new Health Centre, which will be only a
short distance away from both the Cambridge House and Camberwell Municipal
Centres, may offer a satisfactory solution of these difficulties, as by arrangement
the facilities of an infant welfare centre within the Health Centre could be made
to serve the areas of Wards 1 and 2 without any inconvenience to the mothers
residing in these districts.
The merging of these two Centre districts, if approved by the Council,
would be subject to approval by the Cambridge House and Kempshead Hall
Authorities and the Minister of Health under the provisions of the Local Government
Act, 1929.
The accommodation required for the proposed infant welfare centre and
incidental clinics to which reference is made in the appropriate sections of this
report should be on the ground floor as follows :—
A large waiting hall, the use of which would be general for all services
associated with the Maternity and Infant Welfare section of the Scheme.
Clinic Medical Officers' consulting room.
One ante- and post-natal room provided with dressing cubicles.
A weighing room.
A Toddlers room.
A room for the Health Visitors.
A perambulator shelter.