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are also referred and treated under the Maternity and Child
Welfare, Tuberculosis and Mental Deficiency schemes, and
children attending the special schools for the partially sighted and
physically defective are included.
The dental officers have made several visits to Mayday
Hospital to treat patients referred under the various schemes.
The total number of children eligible for treatment is 26,960,
consisting of 26,100 children attending the public elementary
schools and approximately 860 scholarship children attending the
secondary schools. Each dental officer on this basis has therefor
allocated to his care the dental needs of no fewer than 6,525
elementary school children, which is considerably in excess of
the 5,000 per dental officer as advocated in the Circular 1444 of
the Board of Education issued to local authorities in January,
1936.
Inspection.
Out of the above-mentioned 26,100 children, 18,316 were
inspected and 1-3,250 referred for treatment, compared with
15,046 inspected and 10,450 referred for treatment in the previous
year. The percentage of children suffering from dental disease
was 72 as against 69 in 1935. The number inspected represents
"0 per cent. of the total school roll as compared with 60 per cent.
in 1935. The sessions devoted to inspections totalled 100 as
against 83 last year, and 183 children were inspected per session,
as against 181 in the previous year.
The incidence of caries in some of the age groups varies considerably.
For instance, in the six-year-old boys' group 62 per
cent. were referred for treatment as compared with 68 per cent.
girls of similar age, while the 12-year-old boys have 79 per cent.
caries, and girls in the same group 77 per cent. There are three
factors which probably account for this variation : firstly, at 12
years of age there are more teeth in the jaws and therefore more
tooth surfaces likely to decay; secondly, many children as they
grow older tend to become more slack with oral hygiene; and
lastly, children at 12 years of age usually have more pocket
money to spend on sweets.
It is very regrettable that the school entrants have a high
percentage of dental defects when one considers that the majority
of these children should have been treated under the scheme for