Heilsustandurin hjá børnunum undir 15 ár í Eiðis læknadømi

Abstract

State of Health of the Children in the Medical District of Ei&i, Faroes. All children under 15, 727 in all (353đ\ 374 9 ) , were examined in the 6 years from 1945 to 1950. In 1945 the author of this article had for 25 years been the panel doctor of the abovesmentioned district, the children of which constitute the material for this work. Consequently case books of nearly all the children were kept. The results of the examinations were coms pared with the information of the case books about former diseases. What is stated below is therefore a great many things about the health of the children from the cradle to the day of examination.

32 children, 4°/o, had a positive tuberculin test. 16 of these had passed through initial fever or others of the tuberculous diseases usually setting in shortly after infection; the other 16 had had no symptoms. All the children were well at the time of examination.—2 girls had organic heart disease, one—perhaps both of them—born with it. 2 other girls had asthma. 1 boy Laurence* Mooti< Biedl's Disease. N o child under 1 had caries; but of those 1 to 4 years old, 35°/o, of those 5 to 9 years old, 83°/o, and of those 10 to 14 years old, 90°/o. A comparison between this examination and previous ones brings about the conslusion that the teeth of the small children are now much better then formerly, those of the big ones worse: among the children of 2 to 4 years there were 72°/o with caries in 1925, in 1945-50, 43°/o, among the former much more violent then among the latter. Among the children of 7 to 14 years the percentage was 74 in 1925, now about 90. In 1920 and the following years the sea round the Faroes was almost devoid of fish, and cod liver oil, therefore, a rare article. This circumstance was probably the cause of the bad teeth of the small children in 1925.

79 children out of 727 (ll°/o) had had inflammation of the middle ear (otitis media). N o child with flux during the examination. 9 children had a certain reduction of hearing in one or both ears.—About 10°/o of the examined children had or had had umbilical hernia in the first months of living. Most of the hernias disappeared in time. Only 1 child of those 10 to 14 years old had umbilical hernia.—11 children had been operated for inguinal hernia, all of them before they had completed their 6th year. Moreover, 1 boy of seven whose hernia was discovered at the examination. 95 children, 13°/o, had Harrison's furrow. 24 of these, 26°/o, had it only on one side, and especially on the leftshand one (the ratio 20 to 4). 10 out of the 71 with Harrison's furrow on both sides had a deeper furrow on the leftshand side of the breast than on the rightshand one (the ratio 10 to 61).—36 out of 727, 5°/o, had pigeon=breast, and 3 funnel chest.

Most of the above«mentioned deformities vvere little marked. The sternal ends of some of the ribs (most often 3rd to 6th) curved outwards on one or both sides on 33 children, 5°/o. More often row of curves on the righkhand side than on the lefkhand one. If the curves were on both sides, they were often more marked on the right-hand side than on the leftshand one.—13 children were bowvlegged, 6 knockskneed, 2 had dextro convex scoliosis, 28 sinistro convex scoliosis, 18 mild kyfosis, and with 23 lordosis was obliterated. Too deep lordosis was seen 5 times. Diabetes mellitus was shown in a 10 year old girl.—6 children from 3 different homes had had mild symptoms of pellagra; they were fit on the day of examination. 72°/o of the girls in the last 6 months before their 15th birthday had had menses. 38°/o of the boys at the same age had fully developed hirci.