A report on the causes of blindness : and are the eyes of the offspring of the blind affected? Are their marriages fruitful? / by Simeon Snell.

  • Snell, Simeon, 1851-1909.
Date:
1886
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A report on the causes of blindness : and are the eyes of the offspring of the blind affected? Are their marriages fruitful? / by Simeon Snell. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by UCL Library Services. The original may be consulted at UCL (University College London)

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    A REPORT OF THE CAUSES OF BLINDNESS IN 111 INMATES OF, OR WORKERS AT, THE SHEFFIELD INSTITUTION FOR THE BLIND, WITH REMARKS. The present report is based on an examination of the children or young people, inmates of the Sheffield Blind School. Generally- speaking, shortly after admission, each scholar has been examined by me, and thus, with one or two exceptions, each case has passed under my direct observation. The medical certificates with which each applicant for admission has to be provided, though answering well their immediate purpose, are, generally speaking, too vague to render much aid to scientific inquiry. Where it has been possible to clear up doubtful points by communicating with the children's parents or friends, it has been done ; but, in some instances, amoug inmates coming long distances, from the North or South of England, this has been impossible. Care has, however, been taken to render the report as accurate as circumstances permitted. The numbers have been increased by an examination of the workers at the Workshops for the Blind, a part of the same institution. Since the Blind School was opened, I have records of 76 cases ; from this number, 3 are excluded from consideration, as not having been seen by me, or for other reasons, thus reducing the total to 73, Of this number, 41 are males and 32 females. At the Workshops, a total of 46 are employed, and all have been examined. Eight had, however, been already noted whilst previously attending the Blind School, and the number is consequently reduced to 38. Nine are females, and 29 males. The eight excluded were also males. The scholars, with one or two exceptions, are all under 15 years of age, and it is required that each should be of good health, and free from fits and mental or other afilictions, that would interfere with educational work, prior to industrial training. At the Work- shops, competency to learn and to perform the work undertaken would appear to be the only requirements for admission. The series of observations recorded as to the causes of blindness in any given number of persons so afflicted are not many, and fewer are those in which each individual case has been examined by the writer. I trust, therefore, that the present report, even with the limited number treated of, may be of some interest and value. I will proceed to separate into groups the various cases. Ophthalmia Neonatorum.—Among the inmates of the Blind School, in no fewer than 27, blindness can with tolerable certainty be assigned to this disease as a cause, and in one in all probability so ; making a total of 28, or 38.3 per cent. At the Workshops, the number is 10, or 26.3 per cent. The difference in percentage between the blind of the two establishments appears just what would be anticipated. For in the Blind School, all are young people, with very few exceptionsj