Chapter 3
PREVENTION AND EARLY DIAGNOSIS
The importance of prevention
Specific objectives for preventive activities
The Central Health Education Unit
Increasing public awareness and promotion of industrial and road safety
3.1 Although prevention is not itself a form of rehabilitation, it has an important effect on the level of rehabilitation services required. Therefore Government believes that efforts must be made to reduce the incidence of disability by preventive measures.
3.2
The principal preventive measures in the next decade will be:- (a) to improve health education, so that the public understands how to prevent
disabilities;
(b) to adopt further measures to reduce accidents at work, on the road, at home or
during recreation; and
(c) to improve preventive activities, such as immunization programmes against tuber-
culosis, poliomyelitis and other communicable diseases.
3.3 An important step which will be taken by Government to improve preventive health services is to develop health education activities. For this purpose, a Central Health Education Unit will be established within the Medical and Health Department in 1978. This Unit will provide professional advice on health education to Government departments and other organisations which are interested in carrying out health education programmes in their special fields. Among such health education programmes will be that of the preven- tion of disabilities.
3.4
Efforts will be made to increase public awareness of the importance of preventive measures and of the abilities and the needs of disabled people. Simple principles of rehabilitation, the importance of prevention, the need to seek early protessional help ir. the event of accident or illness and the importance of understanding the problems of the disabled will be included in the curriculum of primary and secondary schools and post- secondary educational institutions. Activities intended to promote road and industria! safety will be expanded, in the hope of reducing the number of resultant disabilities.
Specific objectives for 3.5 identification and assessment services
Screening services
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Government will seek to improve and expand existing identification and assess ment services, so that disabling conditions can be identified as early as possible and appro- priate treatment and rehabilitation services can be promptly provided. In the coming decade, Government's specific objectives for the development of identification and assess- ment services will be:-
(a) to improve screening services for both children and adults, so that disabling condi-
tions are discovered as early as possible;
(b) to expand maternal and child health services into a Comprehensive Observation
Scheme for all children aged 0 to 5;
(c) to introduce new screening and testing services and to expand and improve existing
services;
(d) to extend the coverage of, and the attendance rate at, centres providing screening
services;
(e) to establish a Central Registry for the Disabled to be administered by the Director
of Social Welfare;
(f) to establish two multi-disciplinary assessment centres, one on Hong Kong Island
and the other in Kowloon; and
(g) to improve existing specialist assessment centres.
3.6 There are a number of occupations or trades in which workers are exposed to special risks, such as ionising radiation, dusts, high-intensity noise etc. Screening pro- grammes are necessary for the detection of any early functional impairment in these workers. Biological monitoring of radiation workers has been practised for a number of years. Consideration is being given to the introduction of screening services for those
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