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Personal hygiene scheme
For the purpose of assisting at medical inspections, each school nurse is allocated
to a group of schools. Each school in the group is also visited by the school nurse
in accordance with a rota, in order that she can carry out the inspection of the personal
hygiene of the children. At each rota visit, all the children in the school are so inspected;
each school is visited at least once a term, the schools where conditions are
below normal receiving two or more such rota visits each term. Thus every child is
seen at least three times a year.
In 1937, 1,556,682 examinations of children were made at these rota visits.
In 123,663 cases the child was noted as verminous, i.e., in 7.9 per cent. of the examinations,
compared with 8.1 for 1936 and 8.6 for 1935.
In accordance with the desire of the Board of Education, arrangements were
made in 1933, by means of a small index card, to determine the number of individual
children found unclean during the year, thus eliminating the possibility of counting
separately the second or third record of uncleanliness in respect of any one child.
The number of individual children so recorded was 82,357 (compared with 85,300
in 1936, and 79,557 in 1935), figures which represent all those children who were
noted to be infested with live vermin or their ova. About 48 per cent. of the cases
in which verminous conditions were recorded at the rota visits were stated to be
infested, at the time of examination, with nits only.
There are 10 Council centres for cleansing, 21 Borough Council centres, and 9
centres organised by voluntary committees; but, as the last named are limited to head
cleansing, these are not equipped with sterilisers or baths. An additional Borough
Council centre. Holborn, was opened in April.