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School Health Service
Dr. J. W. E. Bridger (Principal Medical Officer)
Part I
MEDICAL INSPECTION IN SCHOOLS
A local education authority has a duty under Section 48 of the Education Act 1944 to provide
medical inspections of school children attending maintained schools in its area. Medical officers in
department have responsibilities allotted to them in the school health service of the Authority to
carry out periodic inspection of children in the schools; special examinations are conducted in the
schools by arrangement with the Headteachers or in the Authority's clinics. All parents are given the
opportunity of being present at every routine or special medical inspection of their children.
Periodic medical inspections are carried out as follows:
(a) On entry to infant school or nursery school, at the age of five years or under and this
inspection to be carried out during the first year at school (entrance inspection). No
further routine medical inspection will be undertaken until the intermediate inspection
unless the child presents with a defect which needs observation or treatment.
(b) An intermediate medical inspection is made in the last year of the primary school or the
first year of secondary school education.
(c) A medical inspection is made during the child's last year at secondary school, that is to
say the school year in which the child attains its 16th birthday. No further inspections are
made after this leaving inspection unless a defect is found to be present, which requires
treatment or further observation.
In addition to these routine medical inspections, special examinations may be made at any time
in the child's school career at the request of the parent, school nurse or headteacher.
The total number of routine medical inspections made during 1972 was 9,823. In addition to
these, 7,697 special inspections were made making a total of 17,520. A comparison of the figures
for routine medical inspection in 1971 shows that 3,236 fewer occurred during last year. The reason
for this fall is to be found in the effect of the raising of the school leaving age from 15 to 16 years
excluding a whole year group from the number of pupils requiring inspections in 1972. An increase
in the number of special inspections was made during the year (7,697 compared with 6,670 in
1971). These latter inspections generally take longer to perform, demanding more of the doctor's
time. During 1971 a questionnaire was circulated to each headteacher at a maintained school
in the Borough requesting details of children in the schools who presented problems in physical or
mental health or whose social background was under-privileged. A large response was obtained,
some 1,700 children being brought forward for special medical investigation. Many of these children
were already known to the service and were being observed or undergoing treatment in the school
clinics, with general practitioners or at hospital. A number (1,034) was left to be inspected whose
recent history was not known. This entailed the addition of these children to the lists for examination
and this work occupied much of the available time in the summer and autumn terms of 1972. As
has been reported previously, a working party recommended that a modified programme of medical
inspection should be considered and this streamlining of the routine medical inspection programme
was presented to the Education Committee and adopted by it, the result being to revise the timing
of inspections beginning in the Autumn Term of 1972.
It is a pleasure to record the increasing proportion of parents who attend medical inspection
with their children. 76% of parents invited to the child's routine medical inspection were present
and 71% of the parents invited to the special inspections. The value of the co-operation whrch is
achieved by the meeting of parent and medical officer is immense and when the teacher can also be
involved, the benefit to the child in its educational environment is greatly increased. The total number
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