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145
Recuperative
holidays
A total of 899 holidays were provided, including 453 for schoolchildren and 60 for
children under school age.
Home help
service
Help was given to 2,928 cases during the year, of which 1,255 were new cases.
premises ana
minor
improvements
Various minor improvements to premises have been made or commenced during
the year, such as the acquisition and laying-out of additional play space to provide grass
and hard areas for the children, the provision of improved heating in a staff dormitory
and the installation of additional pedestal closets at day nurseries.
Redecoration in the modern colour schemes provided by the Council's architect
has been completed at several establishments with pleasing effect.
Division 5, comprising the boroughs of Bethnal Green, Poplar, Stepney and the City
of London.
Dr. G. O. Mitchell reports :
Special
investigation
clinics
In January two special investigation clinics were established, one at the Ida Samuel
school treatment centre, Underwood Road, Whitechapel, and the other at the Bromley
school treatment centre, Coventry Cross, Bromley-by-Bow, being held on Thursdays
alternately at each centre. These clinics provide an opportunity for a full-time assistant
medical officer to examine and investigate more thoroughly those children who present
certain abnormalities at routine school medical examinations, e.g. enuresis, minor
behaviour problems, doubtful cardiac conditions, etc. These clinics are a successful
experiment. The great majority of children referred to them suffer from enuresis.
Health
visitors
During the year the final step in decentralising the health visitors was taken when
those health visitors based on the Stepney public health department in White Horse
Lane were transferred to the Mary Hughes centre in Whitechapel, and the Council's
policy of locating health visitors in or near their districts is now fully implemented in
the division. We were, and we remain, rather short of health visitors; the East End
does not seem to have any special attractions for new entrants in the Council's service.
Day nursery
playground
Towards the end of the year a piece of vacant land opposite the Christian Street
day nursery was developed as a playground for the nursery children. This was a welcome
addition to the day nursery amenities since the limited site of the nursery affords
practically no external playspace at all.
School dental
service
Last year 1 lamented the decline in the school dental service. During 1952, however,
things began to brighten up a bit with the appointment of a full-time dental surgeon
at the Ida Samuel centre and the re-introduction of school dental inspections. There
are encouraging signs of further development in this direction and we hope for an
expansion of the dental services for children under school age and for expectant and
nursing mothers, as well as for school children.
Liaison with
almoners
The periodic meetings with almoners in the division continued during the year,
and the scheme whereby the health visitors supply special reports to almoners continued
to work well. In addition to these reports, the almoners frequently made contact with
the health visitors by telephone in urgent cases.
District
nursing
An indication of the work of the district nursing associations may be obtained
from the fact that for the September quarter the visits paid per 1,000 of the population
were the highest of any division, while the average visits per nurse were also the highest,
as indeed they were for the quarter preceding.
Immunisation
and
vaccination
Immunisation against diphtheria continued at a fairly satisfactory level, and many
re-inforcing doses were given in the schools, but in spite of continual propaganda by
health visitors and doctors, vaccination for protection against smallpox is still relatively
unpopular, and our vaccination figures continued to disappoint us. The only sure
stimulus to increased vaccination in these parts seems to be the immediate threat of an
outbreak of smallpox.
Home helps
There was a small but steady expansion of the home help service during the year,
and a pleasing feature was the entertainment of some of the house-bound old people
at Christmas parties organised by the home helps.
K*