MENTAL HYGIENE

Evening Post, Volume CXXIII, Issue 123, 26 May 1937, Page 16

MENTAL HYGIENE

WOMEN'S SERVICE GUILD Mrs. T. B. Strong presided over a meeting of the Women's Social Service Guild in the X.Z.E.I. rooms yesterday afternoon. Several letters were received from various parts of New Zealand expressins appreciation of-the guild's work in drawing attention to the need for improvement',.. in mental hospitals throughout the Dominion. _ ;• ■ ■ .. The secretary of the Wellington Education Board wrote, in answer to a letter, informing the guild that during the term holidays all schools would be thoroughly cleaned and scrubbed. In addition, the rooms would be thrown open to the sun and'air. . Fumigation, the board considered, was unnecessary. Mrs. J. Henderson spoke on '.'Mental Hygiene." Most of her remarks were from a paper entitled "Man's Last Spectre," delivered to the Royal Canadian Institute last year by Dr. Clarcmce M. Hencks, General Director of the United States National Committee tor Mental Hygiene. Dr. Hencks contended that > "disabilities of the mind are worthy of our consideration, because they are widespread, they are crippling, and constitute one of the threats to personal and national efficiency." In Canada one single form of mental disease, "dementia praecox," is responsible for more chronic invalidism than either tuberculosis or cancer, and he predicts on the basis of past experience that four children out of every hundred born in Canada will, in the absence of adequate arrangements for prevention, eventually enter mental hospitals as patients, almost as many as will graduate from the universities. In fact, Dr. Hencks finds mental disorders as prevalent as physical disabilities. The causes are many, in some cases studies have led to effective treatment. Dr. Hencks considers that as much attention should be given to the emotional side and ' adjustment, of the individual as to germs and physical processes. . He considers, too, that teachers should.receive special training in the mental hygiene of the child and an appraisal of each child should be undertaken by specialists attached to the school staffs. ' Mrs. Henderson spoke also of the need of reconstructive, efforts in our own mental hospitals. Most of those present joined in the discussion, expressing appreciation of I Mrs. Henderson's address. All agreed i that tKs> need for reform in ou* mental