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34
chiefly as ordinary hospital patients, without reference to
Health or School Authorities.
In districts or counties where there is no special provision
for the treatment of crippling, what happens is as follows:—
Granted the early detection of the defect through the agencies
detailed above, the mother is then told she must take the
child to a hospital, either local, if treatment can be obtained
there, or to the nearest large town.
The unsatisfactoriness of such haphazard precedure is
apparent. Practically all the large hospitals where the best
treatment can be obtained have long waiting lists, therefore,
if the child needs in-patient treatment, it is often many
months before such is forthcoming; meanwhile the deformity
increases and becomes less amenable to treatment, and often
the child has left the district before its turn comes or the
mother loses heart at the delay and does nothing further.
Or if out-patient treatment meets the case, it is frequently
necessary for the child to attend three times a week or oftener,
over a long period, which is a severe tax on a working
mother, particularly if living at some distance from the
hospital. Also the travelling to and fro is often harmful to
the child, and if the child is of school age, it means that
it is forced to miss a large amount of schooling.
The question of the necessary appliances must also be
considered.
Hospitals cannot afford to supply them free, equally the
parents usually cannot afford the cost; and often the only
way of obtaining them is by collecting a certain number of
letters from subscribers to Societies who supply Orthopoeilic
appliances, which letters are equivalent to a part or a whole
of the cost. Delay is again inevitable.
After treatment is equally uncertain and difficult to obtain.
If, therefore, the problem of the cripple child is to be
adequately solved, it seems of the utmost importance that
Local Authorities, both Health and School, should formulate