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122
TREATMENT OF THOSE CHILDREN FOUND ON INSPECTION
TO BE DEFECTIVE.
The above table shows that 36.6 per cent. of those recommended
to obtain treatment acted on the recommendation. This
result is very satisfactory; it demonstrates that medical examination
of school children is not altogether useless when unaccompanied
by provision for treatment by the School Medical Officer of the
defects found. I attribute no small amount of this success to
the efforts of the teachers. As before stated, I supply a register
to each school containing the names of those children who are
recommended to obtain treatment, and request the teacher to
ascertain from time to time if the children have been treated,
and to try to stimulate the parents to a sense of their responsibility
in the matter.
In expressing my gratitude to the teachers on the success they
have thus achieved, I do not hesitate to confess that it is tinged
with a lively sense of future favours in the same direction. I do
not think that the teachers have by any means exhausted the
possibilities of their influence, and I look forward with considerable
confidence to the 36.6 per cent. of success in another year
growing into 70 per cent., or even more. And I would point out
that the 36.6 per cent. which I have taken is the lowest possible
figure, for it entirely disregards the 434 children who had either
left school or who were absent when the inquiries were made.
During the year the Education Committee received a deputation
from the Local Branch of the British Medical Association
on the subject of those children found on inspection to require
treatment.
The deputation outlined a scheme similar in all its essential
features to that in operation at Wandsworth.