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66
AUDIOMETRY
This scheme provides for the routine testing by pure-tone audiometer of every schoolchild's hearing
three times during their school life, normally at the ages of 6, 9 and 13 years. A "sweep" test is carried out
in the first instance in school and failures are then retested at clinics under more favourable conditions. Children
failing a second time are then referred to the School Medical Officers for further investigation.
Special cases (e.g. children who fail to develop proper speech, fail without apparent reason to make
progress at school) are also tested at the request of Medical Officers, Speech Therapists, Educational Psychologists
and Head Teachers. A table showing the numbers dealt with during the year is given below, figures
for 1965 in brackets.

CHIROPODY
The attendance at the Chiropody Clinics has greatly increased but the patients are mostly old people.
School children who attend are usually suffering from verruca or athletes foot. Fashion still continues to
dictate and many children are wearing badly fitting shoes, not only in size, but type; some of them show
varying degrees of valgus deviation, fortunately only mild, but unless they can be persuaded to wear good
fitting shoes a great proportion of them will, in adult life, end up with severe hallux deviation probably
complicated by bunions. Deformities in adults seldom respond to conservative correction, old people can
only be made comfortable by padding, etc., but if irregularities of children's toes are detected and treated
at the right age satisfactory correction can usually be obtained by simple conservative methods. Very few
boys and girls are born with foot defects, very few reach adulthood with perfect feet.