Evening star., 1946-09-04

AaiS oNA w ASPAS4SN OAiC oVOi
crowded, inconvenient and disheart-
eningly unattractive quarters for
such clinics, in dark and dingy base
ment rooms" The out-of-town
medical experts charged that such
clinics, were relic of medieval at
titudes toward patients suffering
from syphilis and gonorrhea."
The Health Department points out
that conditions as described by the
experts have been entirely elimi-
mated in the Southwest Center.
Under guidance of DR.. Richard
Laurens De Saussure, its medical
director, the Southwest Center also
issued last year 6,092 pharmaceuti-
cal prescriptions and 9,225 visits to
neighborhood homes were made by
the center's sanitary inspectors who
force corrective conditions under
court threat.
Dental Treatment.
In addition the center gave 6,465
dental treatments, a disease pre-
ventive also recommended in the
recent health survey. The survey
pointed out how health centers and
clinics could help eliminate organic
disease arising from infected teeth
by providing free and more ade-
quate dental care for the poor.
The survey recommended that
funds for dental service for the
INDECENT or semi-indigent should
be assigned for treatment given in
the dental schools, and in our out
patient dental clinics of hospitals
and health centers and other
clinics serving the INDECENT"
The Southwest Health Center's
Colonial-type structure has separate
waiting rooms, record rooms. treat
ment and consulting rooms for
each of its services. In addition,
each service has separate lavatories
and storage space and also separate
drinking fountains.
On the first floor is housed the
maternal and child welfare clinic,
the laboratory, the auditorium. for
public health education, the phar-
macy, the central switchboard and
the venereal disease clinic. On the
second floor is the dental clinic,
the tuberculosis clinic and the Of
flee of the Health Department
Permit Bureau worker. On the third
floor are the offices of the field
surveys for the Bureau of Public
Health Nursing and Public Health
Engineers, locker rooms, restrooms
and a lunchroom and kitchen for
personnel:
Personnel at Center.
The Center's present force in
'cludes five inspectors who check on
neighborhood sanitary facilities, 13
nurses, one bacteriologist, seven
clerks, two dentists, two dental
hygienists, two physicians, two en-
gineers, two maids and the medical
director. This staff is augmented by
nine part-time physicians with DR..
De Saussure co-ordinating the
whole. The staff Is presently short
10 nurses, one social worker, one
biologist for nose and throat work,
and a dermatologist. Present cost OF
maintaining the center is an esti-
mated 100000 annually.
Besides actual treatment of both
clinical and emergency cases, typical
activities of the Center during 1945
included classes and lectures on
health subjects such as nutritional
disturbances; meetings of citizens
and civic associations on health
topics, examination of preschool
children and of children applying
for admission to summer camps;
chest examinations of citizens to
determine presence of tuberculosis;
and showing of health films, with
frequent explanatory remarks by DR.
De Saussure himself.
A native of Charlestown, s. c.,
DR.. De Saussure graduated in medi-
cine from George Washington Uni
versity, was with the United States
Public Health Service for four years,
has practiced here for IA years, and
has also been afiiliated with the
American Child Health Association
in New York.
That he has become as important
to the neighborhood as his work, is
indicated by the comment Of one
woman whose child had just been
treated. Il think the Southwest sec
tion has two wonderful things in
both him and the center We could
not afford to do without either" she
said as she folded away a prescrip-
ton given her there by. q staff
pharmacist.