View report page

8
The Health Services Clinic at Manford Way on the Grange Hill Estate
is now functioning and will be formally opened later in the year; meanwhile
it caters for the clinics that were conducted in temporary premises in
Elmbridge Road.
An innovation started this year has been ante-natal clinics at
Mayesbrook, Valentines Mansion, and Manford Way, for domiciliary
confinements. The Midwives conduct these clinics, where mothers attend
instead of being visited in their own homes, where conditions are not
always as convenient as in clinics. In some cases it is still found more
useful for the midwife to carry out the work at the mother's home.
The Domestic Help Service has had to meet increased calls. 1,211
cases were helped, as compared with 808 the previous year. Welcome
clerical assistance is now available for the Organiser, but it is still difficult
for her to visit cases as frequently as desirable. Much of the departmental
burden of the care of old people in Ilford falls on the Organiser and her
staff.
The Infant Welfare Centres and Day Nurseries continue to serve the
town as efficiently as before. The Nursery in Green Lane should move
to new premises in Goodmayes Lane in the autumn.
It is hoped to introduce into this preface each year a brief special
survey of some particular problem. Last year a reference was made to
the social differences in the incidence of vaccination; this year some
comment is made on the pressing problem of tuberculosis, as pictured over
the last 30 years in Ilford through the medium of notifications of the
disease, notification of deaths, and six-monthly visits carried out by the
Sanitary Inspectors to keep the Tuberculosis Notification Register up to
date. At the moment there is some discussion as to whether this register
should continue to be kept by Sanitary Authorities, and not transferred to
the local health authority. Perhaps this survey will demonstrate that the
data have not been wasted. Owing to shortness of space, much has to
be left out; details have been disposed in a graphic arrangement for easy
understanding: for those wishing full details the relevant statistics are
shown at the foot of the graphs, which are printed at the end of the
preface.
The most startling fact appearing is the enormous growth of the
numbers on the register from 551 in 1920 to 1401 in 1950 (Fig. 2). Of
course the town has also grown considerably in that period, so that a true
picture can only be obtained by a calculation of the number on the
register per 100,000 of the population. Figure 1 shows this. It is
apparent that the number was steadily declining until an abrupt rise began
in 1940, a peak reached in 1945, from which there has been little or no
decline. It must be remembered that the Medical Officer of Health cannot
remove cases from the register; this can only be done by the Chest
Physician or the practitioner notifying the disease, if at all practicable.
Accordingly it may be that many cured cases, who refuse to visit the clinic
for "writing off" as cured, are cluttering up our register and giving
unnecessarily large gross totals. A comparison of the annual totals (Fig. 2)
of the register and those on the books of the Chest Clinic shows that
except for the years 1927-1929, there always have been more on our
register, and in fact the difference is less now than it was 25-30 years ago,
so it cannot be the cause of the dramatic increase in the register since 1940.
The increase can, of course, be due to more cases being notified. In
this connection only pulmonary tuberculosis is of importance, for nonpulmonary
tuberculosis is showing a progressive decline. The attack rate