View report page

Orthopaedic Treatment.— Arrangements exist for the investigation
and treatment of orthopaedic cases discovered in connection
with our Maternity and Child Welfare Services to be carried out at
the County Council's Orthopaedic Clinic held at Combined Clinic,
Bowes Road. Fifteen new cases and 17 old cases were dealt with
during the year.
It is certain that the list of clinics set out in the foregoing
paragraphs will be materially altered during 1947. As will be
mentioned later in this Report, we contemplate adding to our Child
Welfare and Ante-Natal Clinics, whilst immunisation will also
be extended by the provision of new facilities and the addition of
of whooping cough to the infectious diseases against which protection
is offered. We will also be taking over the administration of
the local School Health Service Minor Ailment Clinics, and will be
responsible for the Orthopaedic Clinic, to which reference has just
been made.
It should be possible to make a more accurate estimate of the
adequacy of our clinic facilities generally, when the new School
Health Service has had a chance to function. The problem of the
provision of clinics, whether for adults, school children, or infants, is
one which should always be considered as a single entity, since each
one of the individual services provided impinges either directly or
indirectly upon the remainder. I therefore hope to be able to submit
a more detailed report on this subject in my next Annual Report,
although adjustments will be suggested in the interim as and when
the need arises.
DOMESTIC HELPS.
It will be remembered that the Borough Council instituted its
Domestic Help Scheme in June, 1945. Up to the end of 1945 only
13 cases had been assisted; during 1946 this number rose to 80. The
increase in the demand is also shown by the fact that only one fulltime
Domestic Help was available for duty at the end of 1945, while
5 full-time and 3 part-time Domestic Helps were engaged on this
type of work twelve months later.
The problems of old age, coupled with infirmity, so often
referred to nowadays as gerontology, have come to the front in recent
years. Southgate, with its population heavily weighted towards
the older age groups, must be particularly interested in these problems
which no one can any longer afford to ignore. Our Domestic
Help Scheme, which supplies temporary help to families which
require this assistance, is particularly valuable in the case of
27