[Report 1963] / School Medical Officer of Health, Isle of Man.

  • Isle of Man. Council.
Date:
1963
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1963] / School Medical Officer of Health, Isle of Man. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    7/28 (page 5)
    PRELIMINARY With the changing pattern of disease in children, the problems which now confront the School Health Service are very different from those of a few decades ago but it continues to be responsible for the medical and dental supervision of all school children and of ensuring that those children in need of treatment receive it either through the School Health Service or the General Practitioner or Hospital Services. In the early days tuberculosis, rickets and rheumatic fever were responsible for the early deaths or permanent disablement of children. Some infectious diseases are now under control and the virulence of others is so reduced that they have ceased to be a menace. This change has, however, given prominence to other conditions such as respiratory diseases, e.g., asthma; behaviour disorders, impaired hearing and speech defects. Whilst the main aim of the service is the continuous medical super- vision of all children, the preventive side of the work is still of vital importance and this can only be carried out adequately by co-operating with other branches of the health service, for example, in the immunisation and vaccination programmes against diphtheria, poliomyelitis, and tuber- culosis. Children with mental or physical handicaps or both continue to present the biggest problems and the question of their ascertainment and supervision from an early age is a matter of vital concern. Of equal importance is their future after leaving school. Where possible children with handicaps, whether mental or physical, are educated in ordinary schools but in some cases where the disability is so severe that attendance at an ordinary school is impracticable, admission to residential schools is arranged. At these schools the children are educated with due regard to their disability and they are also given specialised training to fit them for employment after leaving school. Unfortunately, of the pupils who left special schools during 1963 and returned to the Island, none was in any form of employment at the end of the year although one boy had been promised employment in 1964. This question of the employment of handicapped children was raised in the report of last year and it is encouraging to note that the Education Authority proposes to appoint a Youth Employment Officer. As the more severely handicapped are re- commended for admission to the Disabled Persons Register, employers of labour should be encouraged to take their quota of disabled persons on their staffs. While the incidence of infectious diseases has declined over the past ten to fifteen years, the accident rate amongst school children has increased. Although no child of school age was killed on the roads in the Isle of Man during 1963, a number of road accidents involved school children. A large proportion of these were children on bicycles and in many cases careless- ness on the part of the child was the main cause. Road Safety talks are given by teachers and schools are visited by police officers who give similar talks and also examine and test bicycles. It is of the utmost importance for the parent of every young cyclist to arrange for his child to be properly trained. Not all accidents, however ,occur on the roads and those which take place in the home must not be overlooked. The majority of these