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148
Officer to bring to the notice of the School Medical Officer any child, under school
age, believed to be suffering from any crippling condition. Inasmuch as the school
attendance officers are so frequently in the homes of the children of London for the
double purpose of "scheduling" and of securing school attendance, it is found in
practice that they perform an extremely useful public, as well as personal, service
by constantly bringing to the notice of the School Medical Officer, children of both
school and pre-school age who are in need of skilled medical advice and supervision,
many of whom are suffering from (or at any rate may well become candidates for)
crippling conditions. In those cases where provision for treatment is not available
through the Council, steps are at once taken to bring such cases to the notice of
appropriate agencies, e.g., the Invalid Children's Aid Association, etc. Immense
pains are taken from time to time to keep all hospitals and hospital staffs (including
almoners) fully informed of the various facilities for treatment provided by the Council
and they are urged to make the fullest and earliest possible use of these facilities.
(2) The Council, by arrangement with various bodies (e.g., the Metropolitan
Asylums Board and a large number of voluntary hospitals), is able to provide special
facilities in cases of tuberculosis, poliomyelitis, encephalitis, venereal diseases, certain
ear diseases, epilepsy, ophthalmia, and rheumatism, quite apart from the ordinary
facilities available through voluntary institutions or the Poor Law Guardians. It
also arranges as an education authority for the admission of certain children, not
provided for under the foregoing, to residential hospital schools where treatment
can be combined with education. These facilities provide for children of all ages,
from new born infants to the end of the school life. Indeed, they go further for, as
regards some of the conditions, notably tuberculosis and venereal diseases, the
facilities for adequate treatment extend to adults.
On the occasion of all medical inspections, steps are taken through the Care
Organisation to secure treatment for children who attend P.D. special schools or
who are nominated for examination with a view to admission to such a school.
It almost invariably happens that such children are, or have been in attendance, at
one of the departments of a general or special hospital, so that for any necessary
action to be taken they are, in the first instance, referred back thereto to secure
continuity of treatment and after care. Should the case, however, be one for which
arrangements could be made for more rapid admission to residential treatment,
steps are immediately taken to urge the medical or other officer concerned to submit
an application to the Council for such treatment.
(3) All children who have received residential treatment under any of these
arrangements are specially examined on, or soon after, discharge, in order to
determine the most suitable type of school for their further education. Following
up for the purpose of advice to the family or other social or economic reasons is
carried out by the members of the care organisation, in association with the Invalid
Children's Aid Association or other bodies or by the tuberculosis care committees
of the several boroughs. The preliminaries of re-education will usually have been
carried out before the child leaves the hospital or hospital school. In those cases
where regular attendance at a physical education department of a hospital is
required for a further period, such arrangements can usually be made or the child
may attend a clinic or massage centre.
For obvious reasons, it is preferable that each patient should remain under the
supervision of the surgeon who originally undertook the case. In the special schools
the children are under the continuous supervision of the Council's orthopaedic consultant
as well as of the certifying officers. Later on, at the end of the school period,
if the child leaves school for the physically defective, further after care visiting and
placement is undertaken by the After Care Association for Blind, Deaf and Crippled
Children. The Association's reports* are annually summarised in the reports of the
* See pages 164-165.