The following examination is required of each entering student:
Physical Examination: Beginning with the family history, a complete record of all important events relating to a student's physical life is taken. She is carefully examined for asymmetry; curvature, incipient or well defined; traces of tuberculosis; weakness of heart and lungs; enlarged glands; skin diseases, or signs of nervous disorders. She is closely questioned as to all bodily functions and a careful record is kept of irregularities. Eyes, ears, teeth, nose, and throat are likewise examined. Impressions of the feet are made in order to detect weakness of the arch or flatfoot. Measurements of height, weight, and the principal expansions are taken for comparison with later records and for the purpose of comparing with normal standard.
Prescribed Treatment
After the examination the girl is instructed as to treatment, if any is needed. If perfectly normal she will report for gymnastics three times a week. If any asymmetry, curvature of the spine, heart disease, or nervous disorders are discovered, she must report for special corrective exercises at the school. In some cases individual instruction is given for supplementing the work at home. Cases demanding special apparatus and individual attention have been treated in the Physical Education Department of Teachers College, through the kindness of the director, Dr. Thomas Denison Wood. The girls so affected have thus the advantage of the latest methods known to science. If any of the numerous skin diseases are present which demand frequent and regular attention, the student is assigned to a group who go twice a week to a dispensary to receive electrical or X-ray treatment. In cases of enlarged tonsils or adenoids, the necessity for immediate operation is explained and every effort made to gain the consent of the parents. When permission is obtained the girl goes to a neighboring hospital on Sunday evening, is operated upon on Monday, and returns home Tuesday. Each student must have her eyes thoroughly examined by a doctor selected at the Ophthalmic Dispensary. If glasses are needed they are procured at the expense of the parent or donated by an optician who is interested in the school. Dispensary treatment is also necessary in cases of catarrh of nose and throat. Teeth are carefully examined and the girls directed to their own dentists, or to the Dental Dispensary adjoining the school, where we are fortunate enough to have a limited amount of work done free of charge. Cases of asymmetry demanding braces, plaster jackets, and operations have been treated at the Post-Graduate Hospital. Tuberculosis cases in advanced stages have been placed on the special boats in New York Harbor or are sent to Tubercular Camps in the country.
In sending girls to the hospitals and dispensaries the aim is to place them in touch with institutions to which they will have independent access after they leave the Manhattan Trade School.
Statistics
The statistics below show the condition of 278 girls when they registered at the school. The charts are divided according to the departments entered. From them can be seen the need of special care for the health of the working girl.
A second examination of the same girls six months later shows gain in weight, height, and general health; 125 had their teeth put in order; six were treated for defective hearing; twenty had attended the Skin Clinic; all had their eyes examined; eighty-six were fitted with glasses. In twenty-five cases where the adenoids and tonsils were removed the result was increase in weight, better breathing and heart action, alertness of mind, and a noticeable improvement in trade work. Where the obstructions of nose and throat still remain there is loss in weight and diminished chest expansion and a generally weakened condition. The extraction of decayed teeth and the providing of well-fitting glasses have diminished nervous irritability and the frequency of headaches. Three cases of tuberculosis were sent to camps. Seven cases of organic heart trouble were treated by specialists; nineteen girls were given corrective exercises at Teachers College; two were fitted with shoes and braces; two were put into plaster jackets, one for lateral rotary curvature and one for neuritis; and one advanced case of chorea has been placed in the hospital. Of the girls whose records are given in the list it can be said that, with the exception of the cripples and a few others needing simple operations, a year's care shows that very few of them are in any way handicapped by the effects of disease.