A most interesting and instructive account of the work done by a county school nurse during the first year of her work in typical Minnesota county has been given by Miss Amalia M. Bengtson, superintendent of schools of Renville County:
"Renville County is prosperous; there are few poor people, no child is underfed and no one wilfully neglected, yet our tabulated report shows an appalling amount of physical defectiveness. Out of our school population of six thousand we examined five thousand children, and found four thousand and ninety-five defective, testifying that 81 percent of the children were defective. This seems almost unbelievable, and yet it does not tell the whole story, for I could take you to school after school where there was 100 percent defectiveness, where we sent a notice to every parent in that school. Yet, as I said before, Renville County is a prosperous county, and we have every reason to believe that conditions in Renville County to-day are the same as in other counties where a health survey has been taken. The percentages of the defectiveness found were: teeth, 55 percent; nose, 40 percent; throat, 66 percent; eyes, 22 percent; ears, 17 percent; malnutrition, 16 percent; nervous disorder, 16 percent; neck glands, 14 percent; skin, 13 percent; and general appearance, 12 per cent."[57]
In reply to the question, "What of it? What good came of the health survey?" Miss Bengtson says: "Our records show that about one thousand of the children examined were taken to see either a doctor or a dentist, or both, the first year. Parents who at first opposed the work are fully convinced that a county nurse should be a permanent worker among us when they see how much their children have been benefited by a little medical help.
"Besides examining the children, the nurse has been a great factor in bringing about a general education for better health. In our county to-day you are behind the times if you do not know what adenoids are and the havoc bad tonsils can bring; why eye strain is so prevalent and how to prevent it; why teeth should be taken care of; why we should drink plenty of water and eat the proper kind of food; what kind of clothing is best to wear, and why we should not wear too heavy and too much clothing while indoors (we have induced some little boys to remove one coat and three sweaters while in school); why we need to be clean, etc.