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92
Total number of visits to Schools 396
Average number of visits for the year to each school 8.8
Total number of examinations for Uncleanliness (Sect.
87 Education Act, 1921) 93,496
Number of notices sent to parents under above Act 122
Number of children found unclean 2,687
8. MEDICAL TREATMENT.
Minor Ailments.—The children are seen at the parents' request
or on the advice of the teachers or school attendance officers, or as
a result of medical inspection. Each child has a record card kept
at the Clinic on which is entered the defect and treatment, and a
small clinic card kept at the school on which is noted the time
the child spends at the clinic and any information such as exclusion
from school or special treatment, such as "no drill," necessary for
the guidance of the teachers. This card is brought to the Clinic
by the child at each attendance, and; in this way a complete record
of the individual child's ailments is preserved.
During the year, 14,989 attendances were made at the Clinic,
making an average of 96 per session.
Tonsils and Adenoids.—Operation is only undertaken when
other measures have failed. When a child is found suffering
from these defects with no obvious attendant symptoms—adenoids
facies, deafness, or ill-developed chest—conservative means are first
employed such as breathing exercises, astringent gargles and nasal
douches.
If operation is found to be necessary, it is not undertaken until
all oral sepsis has been cleared up and until the child, if debilitated,
is got into a better state of health.
Operations are carried out at the Dispensary in Hoe Street, by
general practitioners practising in the town, one afternoon weekly,
a school nurse being in attendance.
Previous to operation, notices are sent to the parents giving full
directions for the preparation of the child and its after-care.
A Sanitary Inspector visits the home, and if the conditions there
are not satisfactory the operation is carried out at the Council's
Sanatorium, where the child is kept for a few days to convalesce.
No child is operated upon unless a parent or other responsible
person is present in the building. The child is detained until all
bleeding has ceased and the anaesthetic recovered from. If necessary
it is sent home by taxi-cab.