PREFACE 



THIS volume is a revision of Medical Inspection of Schools,, 

 published by the Russell Sage Foundation in October, 

 1 908. The first edition was exhausted within three months, 

 and the volume was reprinted in January, 1909, and again in 

 December of the same year. During the three and a half years 

 that have elapsed since the first publication of the volume there 

 has been a three-fold increase in the number of American cities 

 having systems of medical inspection of schools. In rapidity 

 and extent, this development has been unequalled by that of 

 any other educational movement in America. 



During these few years physical examinations have become 

 an integral part of all the more important systems of medical 

 inspection. The school nurse, almost unknown four years ago, 

 is now an important adjunct of the systems of scores of cities. 

 Dental inspection, then in its infancy, is now being carried on in 

 nearly 200 cities. At that time three states and the District 

 of Columbia had legal provisions for medical inspection. Now 

 the number has increased to 20. 



These conditions have resulted in an increasing demand for 

 a revision of the original text, and this has led to the preparation 

 of the present volume. While covering much of the matter treated 

 in the original book, the text has been entirely re-written, and the 

 description of methods and forms, as well as the quantitative 

 material, brought down to date. Like its predecessor, this book 

 aims 



(i) To be of practical use; (2) to be a reliable source of 

 information as to what is now being done and how it is being 

 done; (3) to be frank in its admission of problems and difficulties 

 as yet unsolved; (4) to avoid all dogmatism, saving that involved 

 in the statement of actual experience. 



L. H. G. 

 L. P. A. 

 New York, January, 1913 



