1904-5.] THE MEDICAL INSPECTION OF SCHOOL CHILDREN. 203 
child. The examination should be full and detailed; the information 
required should be tabulated as briefly as possible. The first examination 
will of necessity be the most tedious in making; it should include an 
anthropometric summary of all school children, having for its object 
the taking periodically of measurements, such to include address, occupa- 
tion and nationality of parents, personal appearance, height, chest-girth; 
(a) maximum weight, length, breadth, and height of head, breadth of 
shoulders and hips; (b) minimum weight, length, breadth, and height of 
head, breadth of shoulders and hips; using test by (1) Sneller’s type, (2) 
by colours. 
Again there should be a report on the condition of ears, nose and 
throat and teeth, and defects in speech such as stammering. Defor- 
mations of all kinds should be noted, also diseases both of the infectious 
and non-infectious groups and other special observations which the ex- 
aminer may deem of import. 
In addition to this primary examination, a record of which should 
be filed, there should be a daily inspection of all cases referred by the 
teacher or head master, this being done by preference each morning, 
and each week all the pupils of a district to which an inspector is assigned, 
should be personally examined by him. ‘These inspections are for the 
purpose of either checking the spread of contagious diseases, or per- 
mitting of the early treatment of what would be more serious cases of 
illness. 
Those pupils found unfit at the time of their primary examination 
should necessarily be objects of more careful medical examination, al- 
though they will be decidedly in the minority of the total number ex- 
amined, but their ranks will be increased from year to year by those 
presenting either physical or mental deficiency. To this class the in- 
spector will na‘urally include an oversight of their course of study, both 
physical and mental, thereby presenting opportunities for correction or 
adjustment. 
In addition to the medical inspector, it will be found necessary in 
some municipalities, such for instance as cities, to establish a system of 
nursing inspection, the offices of which will naturally be extended to 
those in poorer circumstances. This branch will be found of great assis- 
tance in the preventing of the spread of contagious diseases of the acute 
type, and also prevent the spread of those of parasitic origin, and will 
very materially shorten the period for which many cases of the latter 
kind would be kept at home. 
The system of medical inspection should be extended to an over- 
