[Report 1923] / School Medical Officer of Health, Cardiff County Borough & Port.

  • Cardiff (Wales). County Borough & Port Council.
Date:
1923
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1923] / School Medical Officer of Health, Cardiff County Borough & Port. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    15/72
    Further, if it be assumed, as is now generally believed, that rickets is a disease of relative starvation, i.c. of deficiency in certain articles of diet, such as butter and milk, then the occurrence of this disease may be an earlier manifestation of malnutrition than changes in the body weight and the general appearance of the children. The numbers of cases of rickets requiring attention in lOlf) and succeeding years have been— 1916 1 1920 6 1917 3 1921 4 1918 12 1922 5 1919 2 1923 4 Sotliat here again there is no definite evidence that the school population has suffered physically from the present trade depression. It is, indeed, a striking fact that rickets, at least in the more obvious forms, is a ver}' rare disease in Cardiff. The absence of physical deterioration as the result of poverty is probably due to the ela- borate organisation now existing for the assistance of persons in necessitous circumstances, including unemployment insurance, poor-law relief, provision of meals by the Education Authority, and the activities of the Maternity and Child Welfare Committee among children under school age. Dental Diseases.—The dental defects recorded above are only those ascertained at medical inspections to be urgently requiring treatment, and do not indicate the extent to which the scliool children suffer from dental caries. The results of special examinations made by the school dentist are dealt wi^h under a separate heading (page 15). Tuberculosis.—The number of children found or suspected at medical inspections to be suffering from one form or another of tuberculosis was 70 (Appendix I., Table II.). During the 3-ear 11 new cases of definite tuberculosis between the ages of 5 and 15 years came to the know- ledge of the Health Department by notification or through death returns. The actual number of deaths at these ages was 16. At the end of the year 48 school children were known to be suffering from active tuberculosis, cither of the pulmonary or non-pulmonary type, while 95 were so de- bilitated as to be suspectedin many cases of a tendency to the disease (Appendix I., Table III.). Further information regarding different groups of tuberculous children is contained in a report on Physically Defective Children (Appendix II.) which will be referred to later. Defects amon^ Entrants.—The table bn page 8 above, and the more detailed returns in Appendix I., Table II. refer to children in all groups. It is important, however, to arric'C at some measure of the extent to which children are defective at the commencement of school life. Table II.,B of Appendix I. shows the proportion of children entering school who required treatment and Table I I.C. those who required treatment or observation for defects of various kinds. The pro- portion of entrants examined as routine who suffered from such defects as required immediate treatment (exclusive of uncleanliness, pediculosis and dental diseases) amounted to 15.7 percent., while the percentage is increased to 31.9 if all defects requiring either treatment or observation are taken into consideration. This compares with 32.3 per cent, last year. The number found with diseases of the nose and throat is lower, while those with dental defects have increased as comj)ared with the previous year. ]\lore than a third of the defects recorded were affections of the nose and throat, of which the majority were enlarged tonsils and adenoids. RE-IXSPECTION OF CHILDREN FOUND DEFECTIVE DURING THE YE.\R. Toward the close of 1923 a survey was made b3' the medical staff of cases in certain categories referred for treatment or observation during the \'ear. The total number of children overtaken in this surve}' was 1,978, showing 2,037 defects (See Appendix I., Table VI.). Such defects as malnutrition, uncleanlincss, and infectious skin diseases, which arecontinuousl}- under super- \-ision because of exclusion from school, and dental diseases regarding which fairly full knowledge is obtained through the clinic organisation, were omitted from this enquin-. Several of the children previously found defective were absent or had left school at the date of re-inspection. In the first place it will be observed that 1,405, or nearly three-fourths of the children re-inspected, had not received an}' treatment, this number including cases of such a serious nature as heart disease, anamia, lung diseases, deformities, and even tuberculosis. The state of the defects on re-inspection, classified according to whether or not the\’ had received treatment, nia}- be shown CiS follows ;—