The Practitioner: Special Number on the Handicapped Child

of treatment and prevention. Two communications, on the Deaf Child by Miss Whetnall, F.R.G.S., and on the Disfigured Child by Dr. Napier Matthews, are conspicuous by reason of their closely packed information and their understanding of their patient's psychological needs. In the paper on the Mentally Deficient Child by Dr. A. Spencer Paterson, it is unfortunately apparent that the administrative details have not been fully grasped. One reads for example that "They (the imbeciles and idiots) are reported by the Ministry of Education to the medical officer of health as being ineducable, either for low intelligence or for mild intellectual defect with accompanying bad behaviour (detrimental). They require certification if they are not managed entirely at home and this necessitates that a sub-committee of the Local Authority examines the patient, generally in a room of the Town Hall." We have not yet come to the time when a committee "examines" a patient!