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49
Arrangements were also made through the Invalid Children's Aid Association
for assisting in providing children with surgical appliances after discharge from
institutional treatment; such assistance was given in 31 instances. The Council's
contribution is borne from the balance of a fund known as the "Tuberculosis
Contributions Fund" into which contributions made by parents towards the cost of
their children's residential treatment under the Council's tuberculosis scheme
were paid prior to 1st April, 1925. Payments into this separate account are no longer
made as, since 1st April, 1925, the contributions towards the cost of residential
treatment of patients have been paid into the County Fund until August, 1934,
on the basis of assessment on parents according to means and since that date only
on a purely voluntary basis. The balance of the Tuberculosis Contributions Fund
is, however, being applied as indicated above.
Supply of
surgical
appliances
In addition to the arrangements for residential treatment of tuberculous
children, the Council has established six open-air day schools with accommodation
for 515 children (allowing for a nominal roll of 618) suffering from pulmonary
tuberculosis or from tuberculous glands with no open wounds, who do not require
treatment in residential institutions and children suspected to be suffering from
tuberculosis or living in conditions rendering them particularly liable to the disease.
The work of these schools is dealt with in the school medical officer's report (Vol. III,
Part II, p. 46).
Open-air
schools.
In each metropolitan borough there is a tuberculosis care committee or other
organisation appointed or provided by the Metropolitan Borough Council for various
welfare purposes, working in association with the tuberculosis dispensaries.
Tuberculosis
care
committee
work.
Social care and after-care work has been carried on with continued zeal and
usefulness in connection with the Borough Council tuberculosis dispensaries, by the
tuberculosis care committees and by the officers appointed for social services.
Tuberculosis care committees have, hitherto, had to rely on local charitable
agencies when any problem involving expenditure of money has arisen.
Of recent years, however, certain tuberculosis care committees have raised
money by means of the Christmas Seal sales inaugurated by the National Association
for the Prevention of Tuberculosis. In some boroughs public meetings and
lectures have been held for the purpose of starting the Seal sales. It appears
probable that the scheme will have the additional result of making the work of
the care committees more widely known in their own localities and of awakening
local interest.
The Christmas Seal sale scheme is a national and an international effort to
produce funds exclusively for the fight against tuberculosis. The possession of
funds increases the usefulness of the care committees and provides them with
more scope to experiment in the difficult problems which arise in connection with
the after-care of tuberculous patients and the welfare of their families. To some
extent it alters the character of the care committees because it turns them into
local charities for the specific purpose of granting aid, direct or indirect, to tuberculous
persons. It is hoped that as a result it may be possible for tuberculosis
care committees to perform certain forms of constructive work which, owing to
lack of resources, have hitherto been beyond their power.
Since June, 1935, a useful link has been established between the London County
Council and the borough tuberculosis care committees by regular visits to the
Council's tuberculosis hospitals of the Council's organiser of tuberculosis care work,
who acts in the capacity of a visiting almoner and co-operates with the local care
committees in dealing with the social problems which arise.
The work of the handicraft classes has been continued with keen interest for
the benefit of patients who are unfit for ordinary work, thus providing them with
occupations to relieve them of the evils resulting from idleness. No central exhibition
and sale of their work was held in 1936, but sales were held by individual boroughs
during the autumn with satisfactory results. There are now 13 handicraft classes,
one of which serves two boroughs, and one is a woodworking class which is held
daily instead of weekly. For ten of these classes instructors are provided by the
Council's education department. There are also two glovemaking classes for
women which are conducted by the Central Fund for the Industrial Welfare of
Handicraft
classes.