View report page

52
OPHTHALMIC SERVICE.
Children with defects of vision are referred from the school
doctors and minor ailment clinics to the care of the Consultant
Ophthalmologist, Mr. Freeman Heal.
There has been a marked fall in the number of children for
whom glasses were prescribed, but this is in part due to a revised
recording system. This year's figure of 256 relates to the number
of new cases only and not to replacements or modifications of
existing spectacles.
The prescription is dispensed by the optician of the patient's
choice, and the delay is now much less than in the early days of
the National Health Services.
No charge is payable for school children's spectacles provided
under the provisions of the National Health Service Act.
EAR, NOSE AND THROAT SERVICE
Mr. Arthur Miller, Consultant Otologist, conducts special
clinics during alternate weeks at Mattock Lane and Ravenor Park
Health Centres.
Cases are referred from the teachers, doctors, minor ailment
clinics and school nurses.
The waiting list for operations has reached serious lengths
owing to the few children operated on each week and suspension
of tonsillectomy during the summer months.
It has not been found possible to arrange with the Regional
Hospital Board for priority treatment of children referred from the
school clinics. Only the most urgent cases are now being considered
for operation. Some of the children with conservative
treatment do eventually improve to such a degree that operation
is not required.
Apart from tonsils and adenoids much valuable work is done
in the treatment of various forms of deafness, ear diseases, infections
of the para-nasal air sinuses and the mastoid antrum.
Forty-six children were operated on during the year under
arrangements made by the Authority and 84 received treatment
at the local hospitals.
ORTHOPAEDIC SERVICE.
The clinics deal with various types of deformity including
children with poor posture and many early foot defects. A number
of children disabled by more serious conditions such as poliomyelitis
or birth injury receive valuable help and follow-up treatment.