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5
SANITARY CONDITION OF SCHOOLS.
The conditions of sanitation in the schools are generally
excellent, and I have nothing to add to the comments that I
made in my last Report.
ORGANISATION OF THE SCHOOL MEDICAL SERVICE.
This remains as formerly, and calls for no special remarks.
We have inaugurated no new schemes during the past year. I
should like, however, to express my regret at the departure of
the Clinic Clerk, Miss M. Ockleston, to whose devoted work much
of our success at the School Clinic has been due. Owing to
family reasons Miss Ockleston was compelled to resign her
appointment towards the end of the year.
EXTENT AND SCOPE OF THE WORK.
During the year the school nurses made 944 visits to the
schools and 1,146 visits to the homes of children. At these
visits to the schools the nurses made a cursory examination of
no less than 32,943 children, inspecting them for obvious defects,
such as skin disease, sore eyes, discharging ears or verminous
conditions. These inspections, though rapid and superficial, are
of the greatest value, since they usually result in securing treatment
for the condition before it becomes chronic and difficult
to be cured. These "class-to-class" inspections are also of
definite educative value to the children, to their parents and to
the teachers. A summary of the work of the school nurses
will be found in Table 10.
The Routine Examination of children has been carried out as
usual during the year, and does not call for special comment
Three age-groups of children were examined, the entrants aged
5-6, the intermediates aged 8-9 and the leavers aged 12-13. The
number of children examined in each school will be seen on
reference to Table 8. The defects that were discovered at the
routine inspection are shown in Table 2.