DENTAL TREATMENT

Evening Post, Volume CV, Issue 27, 1 February 1923, Page 8

DENTAL TREATMENT

10 THE- EDITOR.

Sir, —There are a good many mothers iii Wellington •at this present moment terribly perplexed because their children over ten years of age have been refused treatment by the free dental department, and ■ I fdiy one would very much like.to know why—for I was under the impression that it was mainly for School children—a large number below school age' are having attention. I don't, say that they, shouldn't, but I feel, that the children entering their last standards; maybe their final schooling, if they are,'of the 1 working class, and especially" should the father be the one wage-earner, should Have particular attention. I also feel it necessary to ask if the picnics and month's holiday under discussion this morning (Wednesday) at the rooms are to cause further inconvenience, not only to the suffering children, but to the mothers, schoolmasters, and teachers. And so I have written, not Inowing any other way of- getting at the best of ways.—l am, etc., MOTHER OF FIVE. 31st January, [On. inquiry we are informed that it is only children under school age and up to the. age of the • primer class, gener-] ally about seven or eight, that come within the scope of work for the nurses working in the clinic attached to the training school in Whitmore street. There ara no appliances for the extensive work that older children often require, and such can only be'treated at the dental department of the Public Hospital. This rule is only departed from where the parents are quite, unable to pay dental fees, where the work is of a simple nature'such as is within the scope of the clinic's appliances, and if there.is time to spare from the nurses' legitimate work.—Ed.]