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90 per cent, mark was passed, the percentage actually being 91.5. This percentage
was exactly maintained in 1929, and in 1930 has been again slightly improved upon,
reading 91.9.
The improvement in this one respect is to be taken, of course, merely as an index
of all.round general improvement in personal hygiene and care, which figures for
other age groups and other conditions fully bear out. Infestation with body vermin,
which, in the early days of medical inspection was found in 3 to 4 per cent, of elementary
school children, has now practically disappeared. In 1930, out of 168,248
children inspected, 248 children only were found with body vermin. Ringworm,
which formerly was a condition very seriously interfering with school attendance,
the numbers detected annually running into thousands, has now been reduced in
the London elementary schools to a mere handful of cases per annum.
The heaviest burden the school medical service has to bear is undoubtedly the
poor condition of the children's teeth. It is probably not going too far to say that
dental unsoundness is the most serious of all the conditions that not only menace
but actually lower the state of the national health.
Dental
decay.
The condition of the teeth of the entrant infants continues to give cause for great
concern. In 1930, of the entrant infant boys, 47 per cent, showed obvious dental
decay at medical examination, and of the entrant infant girls, 47.8 per cent,
compared with 46.7 per cent, and 47.7 per cent, respectively in 1929. These figures
are obtained as part of the result of the general medical examination. Closer
examination with probe and mirror would reveal a still greater amount of dental
caries.
Owing to the extended (but not yet completed) provision made for the dental
treatment of children during school life the dental condition of the older children
has greatly improved during recent years. In 1930, of the 12.year.old boys, 26.9
per cent, and of 12-year.old girls, 24.7 per cent, were found by the school doctors
with obvious dental caries, as compared with 27.1 per cent, and 24.4 per cent,
respectively in 1929, 28.3 per cent, and 26.6 per cent, in 1928, and 29.4 and 27.7
per cent, in 1927. Each year therefore marks, with the exception of the girls in 1930,
a slight but definite improvement. Altogether since 1913 the sum of improvement
is very considerable indeed for in that year 50 per cent, of 12.year.old boys and
47.6 per cent, of 12.year.old girls had obvious dental decay. In 1913 care for the
teeth had scarcely begun and only two or three dental centres existed as compared
with the 65 school dental centres that now exist in London.
In the statutory age groups, 11,291 children were in 1930 referred for treatment
for enlarged tonsils and adenoid growths, or 6.7 per cent, compared with 7 per cent,
in 1929 and 6.5 per cent, in 1928. The better facilities now existing for conducting
operations no doubt influence the examiners in referring cases for treatment no less
than the parents in following their advice. The entrant infants provide by far the
greatest quota of children referred for operation for unhealthy throat conditions,
viz., 10.3 per cent, of entrant boys and 9.2 per cent, of entrant girls, as against
5.4 per cent, of 8.year.old boys and 6 per cent, of 8.year.old girls, and 3.2 per cent,
of 12.year.old boys and 4 per cent, of 12-vear.old girls.
Enlarged
tonsils and
adenoid
growth.
In 1930 otorrhoea (running ears) was found in 1,673 children in the three age
groups or 1.0 per cent. There has been a steady decline in the number of children
with running ears. In 1927 the percentage found was 1.3 and in no year previous
to 1930 has the proportion returned been less than 1 per cent. This gradual reduction
of the number of children with discharging ears is of great importance as, of course,
the condition, while a constant danger to the life of the sufferer, is also the chief
precursor of chronic deafness arising in childhood. It is again the entrant infants
who contribute the largest proportion of the children with discharging ears.
While otorrhoea becomes less frequent as the children pass upwards through
the school, defect of hearing becomes more frequent. This is because defect of
hearing is generally a permanent and incurable condition and the numbers accumulate
during school life: 453 children were detected with hardness of hearing or 0.3 per
Otorrhoea
and hardness
of hearing.