J50 MEDICAL SECTION 



At both maternity and children's hospitals more 

 should be done ; each hospital should form a centre 

 for the spread of knowledge of infant hygiene. Budin's 

 clinic in Paris has attained world-wide fame and many 

 of his methods of ensuring infant hygiene could well be 

 imitated. If necessary, visitors could be employed 

 in suitable cases, or more use could be made of other 

 institutions which already employ visitors. I know 

 from experience how valuable an adjunct to hospital 

 treatment it is to have one's efforts supplemented by 

 the supervision and care of efficient visitors to the 

 homes. 



Finally there is room for much more teaching of 

 those who after all have most to do with the spread of 

 knowledge of infant hygiene maternity nurses and 

 medical men. At hospitals, where instruction is given 

 to midwives, infant hygiene and infant feeding should 

 be systematically taught. I do not say that there 

 is no instruction at present, but my experience tells 

 me that there is considerable room for improvement. 

 In the same way medical students should have far 

 more instruction than they have at present in the 

 hygiene and care of infants. Our tendency is still 

 to lay too much stress on disease and diseased 

 conditions, and to neglect the teaching of the main- 

 tenance of health. 



It is to the maintenance of health that our efforts 

 should be directed, and, if I may be allowed one more 

 word, I should like to emphasize the immense impor- 

 tance of periodical medical inspection during infancy 

 and childhood, when the child is growing and develop- 

 ing. It does not need much experience of work at 

 infant consultations and of school medical inspec- 

 tion to demonstrate this. Just as parents, if they are 

 wise, have their children's teeth inspected periodically, 

 apart from the development of disease, so they should 

 have their children inspected medically at definite 

 periods. Medical men should adapt themselves to 



