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A great number of these cases were sent up by the teachers and
attendance officers. There were four cases of ringworm of the
scalp and thirty-four cases of ringworm of the body. Nineteen
of the cases were due to scabies, sixty-two to impetigo, and 126
to other skin conditions.
Ringworm of the scalp and scabies are not of frequent
occurrence amongst school children in Wimbledon. Impetigo,
however, is common amongst all school children. As it is contagious,
many children suffering from impetigo have to be
excluded temporarily from school. It is a minor ailment which
is responsible for a not inconsiderable loss of school attendance.
(f) External Eye Disease. There were nine cases of external
eye disease amongst the 1,713 routine children examined. This
gives a percentage of 0.5%. Seven of the cases were due to
blepharitis and some of these were very mild. In addition, there
were two cases of conjunctivitis. No cases of keratitis were discovered.
At the Special Inspection there were fifty-seven cases or
3.3% due to externa] eye disease. Thirty-two were due to
blepharitis, and twenty-five to conjunctivitis.
Serious conditions such as keratitis and corneal opacities are
fortunately only rarely found amongst the school children in
Wimbledon.
(g) Defective Vision. Defective vision is one of the most
important defects discovered amongst school children. At the
routine medical inspection fifty-nine children were found to be
suffering from defective vision requiring treatment, and twelve
to be, suffering from squint. This makes a total of seventy-one
cases requiring treatment or 4.1% of the children examined. The
figure for the previous year was 4.4%. The actual incidence of
defective vision requiring treatment is, however, higher than
4.1%. Of the 1,713 children examined as routine cases 578 were
entrants and in the majority of these it was impossible to carry
out subjective visual tests on account of their age. In addition,
sixty-two children with slighter degrees of defective vision were
found at school. These cases did not require treatment but
required to be kept under observation. In the absence of medical
inspection a large number of children would undoubtedly be
handicapped in their school life by uncorrected defective vision,
and their education would suffer very considerably.
Of the children examined as special cases at the Health
Centre there were thirty with defective vision and eight with
squint requiring treatment, and eleven with defective vision or
squint requiring to be kept under observation. The cases which
are kept under observation and not referred for immediate treatment
are those with minor defects of vision.
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