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256. Substantial progress towards these objectives was made during the year and the Service has now a strength of about 4,000. The full staff training programme has not yet been completed but training continued steadily and by the end of the year more than 3,300 individual courses had been completed.

257. Good progress was made in the building up of the first aid and casualty collection organizations. The greater part of the active strength of the St. John Ambulance Brigade is en- rolled in this section of the Service. They constitute an already trained nucleus, but the numbers are not sufficient to man these services fully and a large number of men not in the St. John Organization were continuously under training. Field training exercises were carried out continuously, providing valuable practical experience to all ranks.

258. Training of auxiliary dressers for the expanded hos- pital scheme continued. These men received a series of training courses in actual ward work in Government hospitals and those with special aptitude are selected for advance training to qualify them as operating theatre dressers. During each month about 60 men completed the basic course and half of these proceeded to the more advanced training.

VH. SPECIAL SUB-DEPARTMENTS

Dental

269. This sub-department is under the charge of the Senior Dental Surgeon who is also the dental specialist of the Medical Department. The staff which is available to him consists of 2 dental surgeona, 9 assistant dental surgeons, 12 woman dental assistants, 2 dental technicians and 2 dental inspectors. The work of the sub-department may be considered under two heads, namely, the General Dental Service and the School Dental Service.

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260. The General Dental Service provides treatment for Government servants, pensioners and their families, in-patients of all Government hospitals and for prisoners. Emergency dental treatment, including oral surgery, is also available for members of the general public who are unable to pay the fees of private dental practitioners.

261. Throughout the year 2 main dental clinics were operated, one in Ilong Kong at Sai Ying Pun Hospital and the other on the Mainland at Kowloon Hospital, but in August 1953 an additional clinic was opened in Kowloon at the Li Ker Memorial Dispensary, Kowloon City. About 80% of the time devoted by dental staff to the General Dental Service was given to the emergency and routine dental treatment of Government servants, pensioners and their families. Waiting lists of patients requiring treatment were maintained throughout the year, at the end of which the list consisted of 506 names with dates going back as far as November 1952. In the circum- stances it was not possible to expand dental treatment facilities to the general public, although, in addition to the regular bi-weekly sessions for the general public held at the 2 main clinics, sessions were held fortnightly in 3 centres in the New Territories.

262. The Dental Section of the School Health Service continued to operate as in the past. Only emergency dental treatment, mainly extractions, was available for pupils attend- ing Government and Subsidized schools. Although some con- servative treatment was carried out at one of the school dental clinics on the Island where a full time dental surgeon was continuously employed, owing to lack of staff no routine examinations were carried out by dental surgeons in Govern- ment and Subsidized schools. Pupils found by the School Medical Officers to be suffering from obvious dental caries were referred to the school dental clinics for treatment. Attendances of such referred patients totalled 14,530 as compared with 8,362 in the previous year. The numbers of permanent and deciduous teeth extracted were 1,474 and 10.976 respectively. On the other hand 1,572 permanent and 550 deciduous teeth were filled.

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