View report page

99
Orthoptic Treatment
Hiring the year arrangements were made for children suffering from squint
to attend for treatment at the clinic at Prince of Wales's General Hospital,
all cases being recommended by the ophthalmologist at the Lordship Lane
Clinic. This local service is proving more convenient for parents than
having to make the journey to a central London hospital.
In Hornsey, four sessions a week have been held at the orthoptic clinic
at Homsey Town Hall, and such additional sessions as are needed from time to
time.
Child Guidance Centres
I am indebted to Dr. Cyril Philli ps, Visiting Psychiatrist, for the
following report on the year's work:-
'The work at the Hornsey Child Guidance Centre has continued on
well established lines, but two important changes have occurred A full
Child Guidance Service for children of school age started for the first
time in Tottenham at the beginning of December, 1953, and this enables
the integrated handling of emotional and educational problems to be dealt
with within our area instead of by an outside Clinic with its disadvantages
of long travelling time and a somewhat unavoidable remoteness.
During the three months the centre in Tottenham has been functioning, it
has been pre-occupied with acute cases, mostly of behaviour problems,
where exclusion from school was necessary or urgent placement required.
The treatment waiting list at Homsey, where the lay therapist works
six sessions weekly, is now well over a year and in Tottenhan, where only
four similar sessions are worked, it is reasonable to assume that the
waiting period will be even longer. There has also been an enquiry from
the Juvenile Court in Tottenham about seeing some of their cases for
psychiatric diagnosis and possibly treatment, so that at the time of
review it seems that the moderately ill and disturbed children, or the
minor cases, for which so much can be done with relatively little effort,
might well be crowded out.
The second of the two changes concerns the children aged two to
five years, that is, pre-school age group. While awaiting for the
Tottenham Centre to begin functioning, the Psychiatrists' two available
sessions were spent semi-officially in seeing children of these ages
together with the mothers for advice and treatment. In this project,
which was somewhat experimental, and which lasted a year and had the
interested co-operation of Health Visitors and School Medical Officers, a
great deal was accomplished It was found that these very young