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REPORT ON THE SCHOOL HEALTH SERVICE
DURING THE YEAR 1955.
To the Chairman and Members of the Welfare and School
Attendance Sub-Committee.
Mr. Chairman Ladies and Gentlemen,
I have the honour to present my Annual Report for the
year 1955.
Once again it is my pleasant duty to report that
nutritional standards among the school children were high
during the year. The recognition by medical officers that
some degree of subjectivity is unavoidable in such assessments
ensures that no undue emphasis is placed upon them
but it can be maintained that these results, which are based
on height and weight, posture, muscularity and the amount
of subcutaneous fat and general appearance, when combined
with a knowledge of school performance and, in some cases,
of the home environment of the child as well, can be a
useful and practical guide. During 1955 children were
classified into three groups, A. B and C, and it will be seen
from Table IIB on page 68 (Classification of General Condition)
that only 2.38% of the 5,003 children assessed in
this way were in the lowest category.
It is now 20 years since the term " malnutrition " was
omitted from the return required by the Board of Education
and the fourfold A, B, C, D Classification adopted. The
latter has, for some years, been superseded by the three
categories used in this report. As from the 1st June, 1956,
the heading " General Condition" will be amended to
" Physical Condition ", and it is intended that this will be
a summing up of the medical officer's opinion of the child's
physical condition as a whole. In addition, the A, B, C.
Classification will be replaced by only two categories,
" Satisfactory " and " Unsatisfactory ". The reason for this
change is a practical one in that every child whose physical
condition is considered unsatisfactory will be thoroughly
investigated and this will include his home circumstances,
sleep, diet, etc. and the appropriate remedies applied.
It is, sometimes, not sufficiently appreciated that the
periodic medical inspection of school children which was
designed when Ihe School Health Service first came into
operation in 1907 to detect, as early as possible, any physical
defects which might prevent the child from profiting from his
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