View report page

82
January, 1950. By the end of May, 1951 she had tested all the Tottenham
school children aged 7 or over and in June 1951 she commenced
testing the children in the Hornsey schools. Up to 3% of school
children fail to pass the gramophone tests when group-testing takes
place in schools, About half of these have the simpler causes of
deafness, such as wax in the ears, removed at the Minor Ailments
Clinic. The remaining 1-1.5% are seen by Dr. Clarke, the Aurist,
at the Special Clinic for further investigation and treatment, A
number of children tested early are still under treatment at his
clinic as a result of the survey. Many of these children have
suffered from the effects of old ear infections and Eustachian
catarrh. The Audiometry Survey confirms past experience here in
revealing children with minor degrees of deafness, which would
otherwise have passed unnoticed, or, in certain instances the children
have been regarded as backward. In some cases it is necessary
to recommend that the child has a front seat in the classroom. It
will thus be seen that children have been working under a handicap
which might have escaped notice but for the survey, and so stresses
the importance of making routine audiometry testing a permanent feature
of the School Health Service
Rheumatism Supervisory Centre.
On August 1st 1951, a Rheumatism Supervisory Centre was inaugurated.
The local practitioners were circularised and children
believed to be suffering from rheumatism are now referred to the
Centre at the Prince of Wales's Hospital where they are seen at a
special clinic by the consultant paediatrician (Dr Ian Anderson)
By special arrangement between the Borough Public Health Department
and the Area Education and Health Administration, reports are
obtained from (i) sanitary inspectors, (ii) health visitors and
(iii) head teachers. In this way a full record of the child's
clinical and environmental condition is obtained The child remains
under the clinical supervision of the paediatrician and special recommendations
are made to the school health service and public health
departments.. There is a ward at St. Ann's Hospital for inpatient
cases and the provision of a hospital school for long term cases
is anticipated The integration of hospital and local authority
supervision of the children is assisted by the fact that the paediatric
registrar at the Prince of Wales's Hospital is employed for
three sessions a week at local authority clinics and one of the
assistant medical officers works at the hospital as a clinical
assistant for two sessions a week.