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assistants and 150 helps, giving assistance to 1,900 cases (approximately)
a year; (ii) Convalescent Facilities for mothers and infants, over 70
cases being sent away in 1960; (iii) Loan of Sick Hoom Equipment - 5
articles loaned in 1949, increasing to 1147 in 1960; (iv) Vaccination
against Poliomyelitis — at the end of 1960, a total of 49,399 primary
courses had been completed; (v) Whooping Cough Immunisation; (vi) Night
Attendant Service; (vii) Infant Welfare Centres, many now held at
premises with much improved and modern facilities; (viii) Distribution
of National Welfare Foods (taken over from the Ministry of Food in 1954);
(ix) The ever-widening scope of the work of the Health Visitors, who have
now entered the field of the General Social Worker; (x) District Midwifery
Service — in 1932 there was one district midwife employed by the
Ilford Council; she cycled the area to attend her cases (there were also
private midwives in the Town): the Midwives Act of 1936 introduced a
salaried municipal district midwifery service and from that date the
service greatly expanded: at present there is a non-medical supervisor,
9 full-time and 2 part-time midwives; all the midwives are qualified to
administer gas and air analgesia and their labours have been rightly
eased by five being allocated County cars and four granted an allowance
to use their own cars on official duties; Midwives' Ante-Natal Clinics
are now an important feature, being regularly held at five Clinic premises.
The infant mortality rate (deaths per 1,000 live births) is often
quoted as an index to the health of the district, and Ilford's figures
deserve recognition. In 1932 the rate was 39.8 (79 deaths under 1); in
1960, 17.5 ( 44 deaths) — both considerably under the national average.
Since the introduction of the National Health Service Act a feature
has been the sociological side of the work, reflected in the emphasis now
attached to the individual, as distinct from the community, in respect of
the Personal Health Services.
The School Medical Services can also point to increasing services.
In 1932, there was a school population of 18,187; in 1960 it was 23,383
and, in addition, the Service is now responsible for the medical supervision
of the two Boarding Schools in Surrey and Oxfordshire. The Child
Guidance Clinic staff and treatment sessions have increased and reference
has already been made to the several new Clinics (Specialist and Other)
which serve both the school and pre-school child (an economic arrangement
for all staff).
One interesting and important experiment was the provision in 1950
of a small class for spastic children at the Benton School for the Handicapped.
Its success was such that a separate Cerebral Palsy Unit was