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98
Serious conditions such as keratitis and corneal opacities
are fortunately not common amongst the school children in
Wimbledon.
Defective vision is one of the most important defects
discovered. At the routine medical inspections, sixty children
were found to be suffering from defective vision requiring
treatment, and eight to be suffering from squint. This makes
a total of sixty-eight cases requiring treatment or 3.75% of the
children examined. The figure for the previous year was 5.47%.
The actual incidence of defective vision requiring treatment is,
however, higher than 3.75%. Of the 1,812 children examined
as routine cases six hundred and four were entrants and in the
majority of these it was impossible to carry out subjective
visual tests on account of their age. In addition, one hundred
and nine children with slighter degrees of defective vision were
found at school. These cases did not require treatment but
required to be kept under observation.
Of the children examined as special cases at the Health
Centre there were fifty-one with defective vision and four
with squint requiring treatment, and twelve 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.
These children are re-examined by the Medical Officer
when the school is next visited. If necessary, they are then
referred to the Refraction Clinic for examination by the
Ophthalmic Surgeon.
(d) Nose and Throat Defects. At the routine medical
inspections there were twenty-two cases of enlarged tonsils, one
case of adenoids, twenty-four eases of adenoids with enlarged
tonsils, and two cases with other conditions of the nose and
throat requiring treatment. Thus out of 1,812 children
examined in the routine way, forty-nine or approximately
2.70% were found to need operation. In addition, there were
sixty-seven other children or 3.69% with defects of the nasopharynx,
most of them suffering from enlargement of both
tonsils and adenoids. At the Health Centre eighty-five cases
were found on special examination to require treatment for
these conditions.
(f) Ear Diseases and Defective Hearing. At the routine
inspections three children were found to be suffering from
defective hearing, three from otitis media, and one from other
ear disease, all requiring treatment. There were also one child