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168
The following table is intended to show the deaths of babies
who at one time or another during their first year attended a
Clinic, as compared with deaths among those who never
attended. If a baby only attended once it is included in the
Clinic returns:—

2,234 babies under one year of age attended the Clinics for
the first time during 1936. Within the same period 3,248 babies
were bom and 134 died; 55 of these latter are not included in the
above table, as information concerning them was not obtainable
Although the clinic attendance figures and the births and deaths
figures do not cover exactly the same periods, the attendances of
new cases at the clinics do not fluctuate so greatly as to cause
serious error. Of the 79 babies tabulated who died, 15 had attended
a clinic in Croydon and 64 had not attended, i.e., 19 per cent. of
the deaths were in clinic babies and 81 per cent in non-clinic babies.
Of the 3,248 babies born, approximately 68.8 per cent. attended
or would attend on calculation based on past attendances. The
infantile mortality, estimated on this basis is only 6.6 per 1,000
births for the clinic babies, and 62 per 1,000 births for non-clinic
babies.
The following table is interesting, especially when the figures
for under 1 year are contrasted with those for over 1 year. Approximately
84 per cent. of the former group of babies were found
healthy on their first visit and were presumably brought because
their mothers desired expert opinion and advice quite apart from
treatment; in the latter group, 72 per cent, were found healthy on
the first visit, which may be interpreted to mean that when a
mother first attends a clinic with a child over a year old she does
so because of some difficulty in management ; 69 per cent. of babies