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School Health Service
Concern has lately been expressed about the nature of the school health service in a reorganised
national health service which will be brought into operation in 1974. Statements from central
government departments have implied that an effective service could be provided by general
practitioners supported by hospital orientated paediatricians. A brief examination of section VI
of this report will be sufficient to show the wide variety of services provided for schoolchildren in
this area. Even these activities fail to reveal the key relationship between the school medical officer
and the school teacher on which the real achievements of the service are totally dependent. Only
as the separate disciplines of medicine and education meet together in mutual respect to make
their differing professional skills available to individual children, can the problems presented by
the child with educational difficulties be understood and finally resolved. The clumsy child is a
medical—not a disciplinary—problem. The shortage of appropriate medical staff, now happily
rectified, which occurred during the year showed most emphatically that there is no alternative
to a separate allocation of medical resources to the Local Education Authority. In the absence of
separate provision, these facilities for schoolchildren cease to exist: Local Education Authorities
must insist that any new organisation of health services in this country retains the existing special
responsibilities in schools by the provision of specially trained medical officers with a practical
knowledge of the impact of illness upon education, and a firm commitment to the proposition
that prevention is better than cure.
Future Development
The passage of new legislation coincided with a review by the Council of the whole field
of its activities to determine possible areas of development during the next five years. The Social
Services Committee considered both its health facilities and social services according to the needs
which had been determined within the area. This resulted in an imaginative programme of health
centres together with residential and day facilities for the handicapped. The speed with which
the programme can be implemented will depend upon financial and other factors as yet undetermined,
but its very existence provides direction for the Department's future activities and represents
an attempt to achieve the primary objective of Local Government, namely to serve the people
of the area.
It is a pleasure to record my grateful thanks to colleagues in other Departments for their
ready assistance throughout the year and for their contributions to this Report. I am indebted to
the staff of the Health and Welfare Department for their constant help in the day to day work of
the Department and the implementation of many changes. Finally, I would express my thanks to
all members of the Council for their support and guidance without which our best efforts would
be in vain.
I am,
Yours faithfully,
J. Stuart Horner
Director of Health and Welfare Services
March 1971
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