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At each Centre, in connection with the minor ailment department, there is a very large
daily attendance of cases at the surgery for dressing of wounds and skin diseases and treatment
of ears. Thus at Highgate during the year there were 10,422 attendances, at Prince of
Wales Road 23,937, and at Lancing Street 22,771. Such is a statement of the actual number
of cases dealt with, and the numbers themselves prove that a great deal of useful work is
done.
There are two special features to be dealt with.
At Prince of Wales Road we have a department dealing with the cleansing of
verminous heads, and during the year 3,636 cases were treated. This department is under
the supervision of a nurse, who has two shampoo women working under her. Children
needing attention are referred here, and their heads are thoroughly cleansed and combed, and
on leaving the Centre are immaculate in this respect. Anyone who has knowledge of how
much discomfort and ill-health is caused amongst school children by this condition will
appreciate the benefit of this work.
The other feature I wish to allude to is the special work that is being done at Highgate
New Town Clinic in connection with the operative treatment of children for tonsils and
adenoids, and some other conditions.
Formerly it was the custom for children requiring operation to be done at the Centres
and then sent home, and this custom still largely prevails in London. There were many
objections to his course. Highgate New Town Clinic, in addition to functioning as a treatment
centre for that district, has now become an operating centre for a very wide district,
taking in cases from Islington, St. Pancras, Ilolborn, Hampstead, and Kilburn. The
procedure is as follows:—The children are seen by the doctors attached to the Centres in
their district and those requiring operation are referred for that purpose for admission to
Highgate New Town Clinic. Here they are operated on by the doctors who have seen them,
and will subsequently see them in their own districts, and each case is kept in for at least
48 hours, or longer if necessary, and then returned home and referred back to their own
Centre. On admission to Highgate, each child is bathed and prepared, and its clothes
disinfected, operated on the same day, and kept in the wards for two nights. During this
period any serious complication is detected and dealt with, and, if necessary, the child is kept
in longer than the customary period. We have had a few exceptional cases that have been
kept in for ten days or a fortnight. In all, 1,341 cases have been operated on. At Highgate
New Town, all the nursing is done by nurses supplied by the County Council. At Prince of
Wales Road and Lancing Street, the minor ailment nursing is done by Queen Victoria Jubilee
nurses from the Central St. Pancras Nursing Association, who, in connection with it, have
paid 536 home visits at Lancing Street, and 353 home visits at Prince of Wales Road.
In conclusion, I wish to bear tribute to the skilled and patient work done by the
doctors and dental surgeons, the able and clever way the sisters in charge superintend large
establishments and a difficult class of patient, and the excellent work of the Council nurses
and the Jubilee nurses of the Central St. Pancras Nursing Association.
June, 1924. A. R. Roche,
Secretary to the St. Pancras Public. Medical Sern'cc
and the Highgate New Town Clinic,