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has applied for many years in the dental services for school
children. In the past, expectant women needing dental treatment
have been referred to the dental officer by the medical
officers conducting the ante-natal clinics, and similar arrangements
have applied in the case of young children attending
the welfare centres.
During the year 1,926 expectant mothers were attending
the Council's ante-natal clinics of whom 640 were inspected
and treated by the dental officers and 4,639 young children
over one year of age were attending the welfare centres but
only 315 received dental inspection. The scheme cannot be
considered complete until every expectant mother receives
dental inspection shortly after her first attendance at the antenatal
clinic, every nursing mother receives a dental inspection
three months after her baby is born, every pre-school child is
examined at least once a year from the age of 18 months
onwards, all such inspections to be followed by facilities for
prompt treatment. In the absence of routine dental inspection
for these priority groups it remains a matter of conjecture
to estimate the staff necessary to provide a complete
scheme in the Borough. Five dental officers having devoted
approximately two sessions per week to this work, the
equivalent of one full time officer, and completed 656 cases
provides, however, sufficient evidence for an increase in staff.
Continuity in dental health education and in treatment
remains the basis for the adequate control of dental disease
and it is desirable that this be borne in mind when detailed
arrangements ensue from the operation of the National Health
Services Act in order to ensure that the same dental staff
continue to act as dental advisers to expectant mothers and
the young children and to school children.
The existing scheme continues to make considerable headway
as the appended table illustrates:—