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still further improving the standard of efficiency. There has been some saving of
expenditure by the reduction of the maintenance grants first allowed in
1920-21.
(a) Minor ailments.—79,380 children received minor ailment treatment, and
of these, 77,949, nearly 6,500 more than last year, were treated under the Council's
scheme. The number of attendances was 1,413,255. At the cleansing stations,
2,935 cases of scabies and impetigo were treated. The arrangement with the Metropolitan
Asylums Board by which children suffering from contagious and chronic
external eye diseases are sent direct by the school medical service to the Ophthalmic
school at Swanley has continued to work satisfactorily. During the year,
105 children were sent under this arrangement. Fifteen were suffering from trachoma
and eleven were re-admitted cases.
(b) Visual defect.—31,986 children attended under the Council's arrangements
for refraction. Spectacles were prescribed in 23,577 instances, and 21,357 children
obtained them; this was a percentage of 90.5, the best result ever observed in
London, and 3½ per cent, better than last year. No charge for spectacles falls upon
the rates, tJie purchase being arranged by voluntary committees. 82 cases of squint
were treated either at the Belgrave Hospital or the Paddington Centre, where special
arrangements have been made for this class of ailment, 25 operations were performed
at the Belgrave Hospital.
(c) Nasal and aural disease.—The total number of cases was 13,098, of whom
11,936 were treated under the Council's scheme.
Dr. A. G. Wells undertakes the supervision of the following-up and treatment
of children in London suffering from ear, nose and throat diseases. He reports a
gratifying extension during the year of the method of ionisation as an additional
weapon increasing the effectiveness of the means introduced to deal with children
suffering from ear discharge. Dr. Friel, the introducer of this method, continues
his ionisation clinics at the Almeric Paget centre in Whitechapel and the Kenleystreet
centre, Notting Dale. Another ionisation clinic is in the hands of Dr. Scott
at the ionisation treatment centre in Marylebone. Dr. Claremont is using this
method at the St. Pancras and at the Highgate New Town centres. Mr. Layton
has installed it at the St. George's Dispensary centre, Southwark, and Miss Margaret
McMillan at the Deptford centre under Dr. Burney.
Dr. Wells holds an inspection centre weekly in each of the five medical divisions
at which he sees refractory cases of otorrhcea referred to him by school doctors and
medical officers at the treatment centres. Of 981 cases followed up by him, 482 were
discharged cured during the year. The percentage so discharged varied in the
divisions, viz. : 34 per cent, in the south-western division, 46 per cent, in the southeastern
division, 46.6 per cent, in the north-western division, 55 per cent, in the
north-eastern division, and 65.3 per cent, in the eastern division. The percentage
of children suffering from obstinate chronic ear-discharge that is cured during the
year depends appreciably upon the additional facilities available, and Dr. Wells
ascribes the comparative failure in the south-western division to the lack in that
area of ionisation treatment. He is, however, hopeful that movements afoot to
remedy this lack will prove successful in the near future. Of 80 children
suffering from pure deafness attending Dr. Wells' inspections, he was able to discharge
54 as cured.
The method of ionisation introduced first, so far as the school medical service
of the country is concerned, in the London school treatment centres, has attracted
very considerable attention. Dr. Friel's methods have been watched by numerous
medical officers from other education authorities and several of these have now
installed the treatment, which is meeting with much success. The treatment, however,
is not a panacea, and the cases to be submitted must be selected with care
by an expert in the method. To subject all children suffering from otorrhoea to
the treatment would be merely to court failure in certain instances.
The treatment
of ear
diseases
ionisation,
etc.