HEALTH OF CHILDREN

Evening Post, Volume CVI, Issue 127, 26 November 1923, Page 8

HEALTH OF CHILDREN

DISCUSSIONS AT MEDICAL

CONFERENCE

IMPORTANCE OF CHILD WELFARE^

Some interesting impressions of the work of the Medical Conference recently held at Melbourne were given to a "Post" reporter this morning by Dr. Truby King, who returned by the Maun-, ganui to-day. The majority of the papors read at the conference were necessarily of a technical nature, but Dr: King states that the general impression amongst the representative gathering of doctors who attended from all parts is is that the conference was a very successful one, and that it will be productive of much' good. The most conspicuous figure at the conference was Sir William MacEwan, the eminent professor of surgery' at Glasgow University j Matters of interest and importance, ! bearing upon public health, surgery, and medicine, were dealt with in a wide range of papers. Dr. Truby King stated that the . child welfare section was well represented in the addresses given. Steady progress was being made, he said, both throughout the Commonwealth and in the Dominion, and it was generally recognised that niuch more attention ought, to be paid to the subject, and especially to the facilities for teaching medical students and to giving the subject its proper status as an essential part of the training for the medical profession. It was also recognised that while considerable advance had been made during the last few years, there ought to be , more systematic and more definite training for nurses in general. He referred particularly to training in midwifery j and the care of the mother and child. ! The training should be given quite apart j from the questiorT as to,, whether the j nurse was to specialise in"that particular, direction. - . CAUSES OF' RICKETS. The most interesting paper upon recent investigations in connection with diseases of children, said Dr. King, was read by Dr. Elsie Dalziell, of Sydney; j it gave the results of investigations made by herself and others at the Lister Institute and at Vienna University into the fundamental causes of rickets, which, ] during the last few years, has seriously I involved perhaps 75 per cent, of children born in the later stages of the war,; and during the two following years, in cities such as Vienna and Moscow. The extreme gravity of the'cutting off of the ultra violet rays of the spectrum by smoked window glass, and of children living indoors instead of out of doors iv crowded cities containing high buildings, was specially emphasised. The importance was also stressed of a due proportion of animal fats in food. These conclusions were in accord with'investigations made in America during the last two years, and were considered highly, significant. ' ■