The face can reflect insufficient sleep, digestive disturbances, embarrasment, and worry.
At young children clinics, and also at school inspections, we look at the skin of babies and children to help us judge thier health.
The skin has many functions
1. Protection against germs.2. Sweating leads to evaporation and is a method of cooling the body.
3. Glands in the skin produce a substance which, when acted on by sunlight, gives Vitamin D.
4. The reception of stimuli, for example pain, touch, pressure, heat, cold.
5. Some parts of the body produce sweat, which has a strong smell. Sweat is increased with temperatures, humidity, exercise, pain, nausa, mental excitement, nervousness, diaphoretics, and also in some feverish diseases, for example malaria, tuberculosis, and rheumatic fever. As the skin is so important it should be cared well.
Daily washing and bathing with water and soap is necessary to get rid of excess sweat, dried skin, dust, germs, and dirt.
Health workers' and nurses' hands require special attention–they must be kept very clean, with no cuts or abrasions. Nails should be kept short and scrubbed. Nail polish is a waste of money.
Hand-washing is very important, after defaecation and before preparation or eating food. If there is insufficient water for washing hands, diarrhoeal disease becomes more frequent.
Feet should be kept very clean and examined regularly for jigger fleas if common. Shoes should be comfortable and fit well with a heel at a comfortable height. As the feet contain many sweat glands, if stockings or socks are worn they should be washed daily. The toe-nails should be cut regularly. Some covering for the feet helps to avoid hookworms. If the feet smell strongly it is usually due to a yeast or fungus infection.
Teeth should be brushed daily. Toothpaste and powder are pleasant but not really necessary. A stick or brush helps to stimulate the gums and increase the circulation of blood, and this keeps the mouth healthy as well as removing dirt and scraps of food. Fruit, suger cane, raw vegetables, and hard food help to exercise the teeth and also to clean them.
Hair should be thoroughly brushed and combed everyday to remove dust. Every week it should be washed with a shampoo or soap, and well rinsed to get all the soap out of it. Hair brushes and combs should be washed at the same time in order not to dirty the clean hair. Dandruff can be treated by using a special shampoo or lotion. Scales of dandruff dropping on the neck can cause a rash, and look very unattractive.
LICE
There are three kinds: head lice, body lice, and pubic lice.
The head louse lays its eggs on the scalp and attaches them to hairs: these eggs are called nits. The female can lay 60 in a month and they are fully grown in 21 days, so it is easy to see how quickly a head may become infested.
The body louse lays eggs in the clothing and also lives by biting and sucking blood. It, too, lays many eggs per week. Lice can carry dangerous diseases such as epidemic typhus fever and relapsing fever.
The public louse has a different shape (like a very small crab) with strong claws, and lives in the public hair, the axillae, and the eyebrows. It causes little spots of blood to be seen on the underclothes and it produces severe itching.
