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133
Appendix A.
[COPY]
Report by the School Medical Officer as to a Scheme for
Parents' Payments for Medical Treatment.
In accordance with the instructions of the Sub-Committee, I
beg to report as follows on the scheme for collecting payments
from parents towards the cost of medical treatment provided by
the Education Committee.
The question arose early in the present year out of a letter
dated the 8th December, 1922, from the Board of Education, in
which the Board stated that they had had under consideration the
statement submitted under Section 1 (d) for Form 9M for 1922-23,
and that in the opinion of the Board, a satisfactory scheme for
parents' payments for medical treatment should include provision
on the following general lines:—
(1) The actual cost to the authority of each form of
treatment provided as part of the School Medical Service
should be ascertained as nearly as possible, exhibited in the
school clinics and otherwise brought to the notice of the
parents.
(2) Free treatment should only be provided for children
whose parents' income is below an income scale, which should
be drawn up by the Authority and approved by the Board.
(3) For parents whose income is above the scale there
should be a schedule of charges for each of the approved
forms of treatment, e.g.: (i) Minor ailments; (ii) Spectacles;
(iii) Dentistry; and (iv) Operations for tonsils and adenoids.
N.B.—For the purpose of their own administration, the
Board do not regard refraction work as treatment within the
meaning of Section 81 of the Education Act, 1921.
(4) The Board do not think it necessary to require any
elaborate scales of sliding charges corresponding to small
variations in income above the income scale. A flat rate for
each form of treatment would probably suffice as a rule, but
a box should be placed in each clinic in which parents who
are able to do so can place voluntary contributions over and
above the fixed charge towards the total ascertained cost of
the treatment. For large variations in income, however,
some variation in charges would be made, e.g., for parents
with double the amount of the income scale, the charges
should also be doubled, provided that such charges do not
exceed the actual cost of the treatment to the Authority.
(5) In the case of minor ailments, the Board would think
it a reasonable arrangement if no charges were made for
attendances at a school clinic for the first week or two.
(6) In order to reduce the cost of collection, the parents'
payments should, as far as possible, be taken at the clinics
when the children attend for treatment.