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80
A number of these cases cannot afford to pay a General
Practitioner and will not take the trouble to attend a London
Hospital on account of the time and expense of getting there.
Also most of the large hospitals are raising objection to so many
school children being sent for treatment. East Ham is unprovided
with a hospital out-patient department to cope with the
work. The district is amply supplied with general Medical
Practitioners who in their private practice deal with the majority
of minor cases requiring treatment, but for operations of the
throat and nose and for dental affections the majority of the
parents cannot afford to pay. There remains the Poor Law
provision which is also unsatisfactory.
As will be seen from the defects found and remedied (p.79)
there is much to be done and this is a serious problem.
I should suggest that a School Clinic be established as an
immediate solution of the problem of dealing with the defects.
Section 13, sub-section (8) of the Education (Administrative
Provision) Act, 1907, includes among the powers and
duties of a local Education Authority the power to make such
arrangements as may be sanctioned by the Board of Education
for attending to the health and physical conditions of the children
educated in Public Elementary Schools. We have power
to exclude from school all children who are considered to be unfit
for attendance until the defects found are remedied.
It is useless urging parents to obtain treatment if no
adequate provision is made for such treatment. School Clinics
have already been established at Deptford, Bradford, York,
Brighton, Sheffield, etc. The routine work of the school clinic
should be re-examination of cases referred from Medical
Inspection, treatment of Ringworm, Impetigo, Itch, Eardischarges,
etc. Only those cases which are known not to be
under treatment by a Medical Man and those who upon enquiry
are found to be unable to pay for treatment would be undertaken.
Defective Vision.—These should be tested and spectacles
provided, the parents paying the whole or Dart of cost.