View report page

80
Aural Clinic.
The Aural Clinic is held at Valentines Mansion, the Surgeon attending
one session weekly.
50 sessions were held during 1953 and 1,205 attendances were made
by 630 children of school age, of whom 321 were new cases.
The Consulting Oto-Rhino-Laryngologist (Mr. Morton Marks) submits
the following report: —
"The year 1953 has shown a marked improvement in the position
of children awaiting Tonsil and Adenoid operations in this area,
although we can by no means as yet regard the situation with complacency.
We have so managed to reduce the number on our waiting
list that the average delay in admission now amounts to little over a
year, as opposed to the position this time last year when the period
was anything up to six years.
This improvement has chiefly been effected by the opening of a
very efficient little operating unit at the Isolation Hospital; this consists
of 6 beds, arranged in pairs in 3 cubicles, an anaesthetic room
and a small theatre. By utilising these 6 beds twice weekly I have
been able to operate on 12 children every week. This unit in conjunction
with the Consultative Clinic is a great advance—in that 1
now no longer have to rely on the good offices of other hospitals to
deal with our cases but can now treat them all myself. There is, however,
one difficulty in this arrangement. These beds are not officially
allotted to me but are still on the establishment of the Consultant
in Infectious Diseases, by whose grace I am allowed to use them.
Consequently when these beds are required by him, it has been necessary
to suspend operations. This was the case for a little over three
months during the year—quite apart from a further three months
suspension due to the epidemic of Infantile Paralysis. Nevertheless,
in the six months remaining I operated on 274 cases.
Waiting List on 1.1.53 354
Waiting List on 31.12.53 260
The major surgery I still take in to one of my other Hospitals
but I have found that the incidence of chronic aural disease necessitating
mastoid surgery appears to be diminishing and I believe this to be
very largely due, among other things, to the fact that the pre-disposing
factors such as infected tonsils and adenoids can now be more
urgently dealt with.
With regard to my Clinic we had a total of 1312 attendances of
children of school age and under throughout the year of whom 367
were new cases. Of these, 180 children were put down for operation.
From these figures it will be seen that if only we could further reduce
our waiting list by a regular and uninterrupted service at the Isolation
Hospital the so-called tonsil and adenoid problem in this area, at
least in relation to the School Health Service, would cease to exist."
(It is to be regretted that similar arrangements for operations at
the Ilford Isolation Hospital have not so far in 1954 been provided.)
The following table shows the work of the Clinic:—