Montgomery County sentinel. [volume] (Rockville, Md.) 1855-1974, 1957-08-15

i
getting enough staff. However,
what staff there is is of high cal
iber and continual challenge for
our leady health officer to keep
pace with her colleagues.
Inadequate salary, she feels, is
the cause of the continuing num-
Der of vacancies on the staff al
though this year for the first time
she has a waiting list of one for
positions of staff doctors in her
clinics.
DIR. Peoples Liked
Here, DR.. Bajda and l went off
on a tangent to discuss our M
tual friend, DR.. Margaret Peoples,
who has come to the rescue of the
health department clinics any
number of times when unex-
pected vacancies have occurred.
met Margaret Peoples last
year when l helped her take care
of the little boys at the Girl Scout
Camp and she is definitely one of
the warm and wonderful people
in DR.. Bajda's experience, and
mine, and some day l hope to
devote whole column to her.
The health departments role,
according to DR.. Bajda, should be
to point out the problems to the
people and then let the commu-
nifty decide how it wants to handle
them.
For example, there is a need
for more hospital beds and the
question is whether to continue
using the Districts hospital facili-
ties or to struggle to build up
the county hospitals.
1t is also up to the community
to choose its solution for mental
illness. DR.. Bajda sees this as a
choice between spending more
money on psychiatrists and thera.
pists or having more recreation
and educational facilities to de.
velop socially and emotionaily
well rounded individuals.
Another educational task is TO
teach people to rely on their doc
tors and not self-diagnosis.
The dangers of this practice,
which is all too prevalent, are
pointed out by the recent increase
in nephritis and rheumatic fever,
which DR.. Bajda feels are compli.
cations resulting from last
springs unusually large number
of cases of "strep" throat.
One particular problem that DR..
Bajda stressed is the need of the
physically handicapped in the
county who do not qualify for vo-
cational rehabilitation but still
have need to work.
Cardiac Cases Cited
She cited cardiac cases and cpl.
leptics as examples of the group
which needs local opportunities
for employment such as the Good
viii Industries offer in the Dis.
trict.
The depth of understanding and
sympathy with the county's
health problems which DR.. Bajda
has revealed did not happen over
night.
4 Born in Chicago, Leonore Bajda
was raised in East Orange, N. j.
When her faInily's fortunes were
wiped out in the first year of the
depression, she won scholarship
and the interest of group OF
women of the Lutheran Church
and attended the Wagner Lu.
theran College in New York.
Hoping TO become medical
missionary, she worked a year
after graduating and then went on
to the only women's medical
school in the world which is
located in Philadelphia
Worked in District
After two years Of residency in
pediatrics at ID. c. General Hos
pital, she became assistant health
officer and maternal and child
health clinician in Mississippi
In 1852, she went to Chapel Hill
to take her degree in Public
Health Administration and then
went back to Mississippi as act
ing health officer for five of the
rural counties in the state.
In this job she covered some
1000 miles month and two Of
her most vivid Impressions are
the day she was shot at by a IL
year-old boy while she was driv.
ing along a deserted highway and
the day she achieved 100 percent
| attendance Of both children and
! parents at PTA pre.school
| health examination.
DR. Bajda never found out why
the unknown boy wanted to shoot
her. She stepped on the gas and
left the scene fast. Getting all OF
the parents interested in her
health program caused her excite.
ment over the attendance record.
She is also pleased to remem-
Der that somewhere in Mississippi
is a little girl who answers TO the
name of Bajda Jean, as the result
Of one grateful patiets way Of
saving thank you" to her doc.