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111
June, 1931.
To The Medical Officer of Health,
Barking.
From the Public Dental Officer.
Sir,
I have the honour to submit the Report on the Dental
Service of the Maternity and Child Welfare Scheme for the year
ended December 31st, 1930.
During the period under review there has been an increase in
the number of treatments compared with the corresponding period
last year, by 100, and of this increase 50 per cent represents
additional conservative work.
This may be interpreted as a more enlightened aspect among
patients and that the age of the patients attending is younger than
in the past.
The younger the mother attending for treatment the more
manifest is the desire for prompt attention of a conservative nature
during pregnancy, while the older mother, with an existing family,
is too willing to accept with fatalism that " for every child a tcoth
is lost," so much so that after her third or fourth child, her desire
is that the trouble she has experienced with teeth, dependent or
independent of child bearing, be finished and artificial substitutes
supplied.
♦
No cases of unique professional interest have been presented
for treatment, broken appointments are few and usually due to
some domestic cause.