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SCHOOL HEALTH SERVICE
This is the third Annual Report on the School Health Service in Lewisham since the
implementation of the Greater London Local Government Act, and the reorganisation
of services in the London Boroughs. Close liaison with the Inner London
Education Authority and the Medical Adviser's Department at County Hall has been
maintained.
The overall health of schoolchildren in Lewisham remains good. As before, all
children have had a full medical examination, including an audiometer test during
their first term on admission to school. For all children attending ordinary schools
further examinations have been made at seven or eight years of age, on entering
secondary school and before finally leaving school. Annual personal hygiene examinations
have continued and the need for these has been shown by the occasional
detection of children with scabies in schools in different parts of the Borough.
Nocturnal enuresis and obesity remain two of the commonest problems. Owing to
the apparent increase in the numbers of children with these conditions three additional
special clinic sessions per week were commenced during the year. Two of these are
held in the School Health Centre, at 78 Lewisham Park and the other at the Churchdown
Health Centre, Downham. Existing sessions at the Amersham Road Health
Centre and Sydenham Children's Hospital continue. An average of fourteen children
are seen per session. It should be noted that neither amphetamine drugs or any of
their derivatives are now prescribed in these clinics, having been superseded by
medication which has been shown to be free of serious habit forming side-effects.
Special Schools
There arc now four special day-schools in Lewisham and a unit in Sedgehill Comprehensive
Secondary School for partially hearing children.
1. The Nansen School for Partially Sighted Children,
59 Pendragon Road, Downham
2. Meeting House Primary School for the Educationally Sub-normal,
Roundtable Road, Downham
3. Woodlands Open Air School for Delicate Children of Primary School Age,
Shroffold Road, Downham
4. Brent Knoll School for Delicate Children of Primary and Secondary School Age,
Beacon Road, S.E.I3
All of these schools take some handicapped pupils who are resident in adjacent
Boroughs in addition to Lewisham children.
Those attending Brent Knoll School continue to be temporarily accommodated in
the Hither Green Primary School in Beacon Road. It is anticipated that the new
building, now being erected on the site of the old Brent Knoll School in Mayow
Road. Forest Hill, will be completed and ready for the children to move in at the
commencement of the next academic year in September, 1968; they will then be
joined by the pupils of Woodlands School which is due for demolition.
As mentioned in last year's report Lewisham children needing education in a
special school for physically handicapped pupils now attend the new Charlton Park
School in the Borough of Greenwich.
In September this year the special teaching unit for young deaf and blind children
was moved from Hither Green Hospital, to more suitable accommodation at the
Witney School for partially sighted children in Southwark.
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