PEDIATRICS Vol. 1 No. 5 May 1948, pp. 662-667
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TESTIMONY ON S. 1290 PREPARED FOR THE HEALTH SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE SENATE COMMITTEE ON LABOR AND PUBLIC WELFARE, MARCH 9, 1948

Mr. Chairman, the American Academy of Pediatrics welcomes this opportunity to discuss with this committee a bill designed to make more adequate provision for the health of school children. I would like to begin by giving you a brief statement of the background for certain factual data which I wish to present.

I am a pediatrician, a graduate of the Harvard Medical School. Prior to entering military service, I was engaged in teaching at the Harvard Medical School and was in private practice in Boston. In 1945, upon return from overseas duty, I learned that the Academy had undertaken a courageous venture: a nation-wide survey of child health services to serve as the basis of well-founded recommendations for the improvement of child health. I was asked to direct this study which I have done, having been given a continued leave-of-absence from the Harvard Medical School and the Children's Hospital in Boston.

This study, now nearing completion, has been thorough. An exhaustive survey has been made of facilities and services available for the medical care and health supervision of children throughout the nation, taking into account private practice, hospitals, and community health agencies. Furthermore, we have made a survey of medical schools and the hospitals which have been approved for pediatric residency in order to determine the amount and quality of teaching being given to those who are to care for children, either as general practitioners or as pediatricians. This study of pediatric education has been considered an important part of our undertaking since we are convinced that there is little use in planning for more and better health services unless consideration is first given to providing well-trained physicians to render those services.

At the outset the Academy recognized that it was undertaking a task far beyond its own resources and experience. Therefore, it was deemed advisable to request the cooperation of the U. S. Public Health Service and the U. S. Children's Bureau. Dr. Parran and Dr. Martha Eliot were approached; both agreed to give the Academy all possible help; both assigned from their respective agencies personnel to serve on our executive staff. This pattern of cooperation between private medicine and government agencies has, we feel, demonstrated that more can be accomplished along these lines by both working together than could be accomplished by either working separately. At the same time the participation of government agencies in this project has been a source of confusion to some who have erroneously assumed that this was a government survey. I wish to make it clear that the study has been directed by myself under the supervision of a specially appointed Academy committee, of which Dr. Warren Sisson of Boston is Chairman.