Infectious diseases of school children : a manual for the use of teachers.

  • Connecticut. State Board of Health.
Date:
1908
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Infectious diseases of school children : a manual for the use of teachers. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    is conveyed through common use of drinking cups, pens, pencils, books and close contact in study and play. Sus- picious cases must be sent home at once and referred to the health officer—who renders his services to the family gratuitously in this work and is paid by the town to do it. Upon him all responsibility may be thrown. They should not return to school without his certificate. Skin eruptions, sore throats, red eyelids and discharges from the ear and nose should be watched—and such pupils excluded from school. Premonitory or early symptoms of most diseases are dullness, stupidity, gaping, inability to apply to study, head- ache, crossness, sore throat, sick stomach and drowsiness. All such should be carefully inquired into. Characteristic symptoms of the following infectious diseases should be borne in mind and will prove helpful: CHICKEN-POX. Cause.—Chicken-pox, like measles, is a very contagious disease, and is usually contracted by exposure to another case, rarely through a third person. It attacks children of all ages, one attack being, as a rule, protective. The period of development is from ten to fifteen days. Symptoms.—The eruption is generally the first and often the only symptom. It usually appears first on the face, scalp or shoulders, as small, red, widely scattered pimples, and may spread slowly over the trunk and limbs. These pimples soon fill with serum and become little, white, shiny blisters called vesicles; the vesicles in turn dry up and crust over. The eruption of chicken-pox appears in crops. After an interval of some hours, usually a day or so, a second crop appears and then a third; this continues for four or five days, or a week. The eruption therefore being of different ages, all stages may be present at the same time in the same region. This multiformity is one of the most distinguishing features of chicken-pox. Precautions.—The teacher will usually notice only the presence of a few isolated pimples on the face. The dis- ease may be conveyed as long as the crusts are present.