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156
TO THE CHAIRMAN AND MEMBERS OF THE
EDUCATION COMMITTEE
Ladies and Gentlemen,
I have the honour to present the third Annual Report on the
School Health Service of the London Borough of Bromley.
Health of School Children
The School Health Service has continued to screen, medically
and fully, pupils in the three age groups, entrants, 10 years and 14
years old, and though approximately 700 fewer of these routine
health checks have been carried out, the results have remained
satisfactory. Less than 20% of pupils were referred for treatment.
Details of these examinations are shown later in the report. The
fact that there is even this percentage indicates the value of
these examinations because in the main, these defects were discovered
for the first time. In only one child was the general
nutritional and physical condition reported as unsatisfactory.
Co-operation with other Services
The main objective of routine and special examinations is to
find pupils who, by virtue of handicap, are in need of special educational
provision. Continuity with the Child Welfare Clinics is
essential as it is generally estimated that only 80% of children
continue to attend Child Welfare Clinics after the age of two years.
The report indicates how this continuity is provided by allocation
of Medical Officers and Nursing Staff to linked groups of schools
and clinics, thus enabling exchange of information and contact
between colleagues known to each other in the schools, clinics and
general medical practices.
References for medical treatment are made to the medical
practitioner except in certain defined categories where the emphasis
is mainly educational or the Authority provides its specialist
service as for speech therapy or supplementary ophthalmic treatment.
An exception to this applies to the orthopaedic referrals.
During the year, there was an extension of the scheme introduced
the previous year to enable the Assistant Medical Officers to be
designated Medical Liaison Officers and, as such, to visit Wards
and to attend at Hospital Paediatric Clinics by appointment for
detailed discussions with specialist and medical practitioners on
handicapped children also likely to be in need of special educational
treatment.
School Psychological Service
The report indicates the stresses which financial stringencies
and a national shortage of staff are placing on this growing local