Estimates of the incidence of mental retardation vary from 1 to 3 per cent of the population. Prevention of this disability requires different methods, depending on the cause. Retarded persons are of four broad categories: Those who are the low end of the normal distribution curve of intelligence in the general population, without any specific illness or defect; those in whom retardation is culturally and socially determined; those who are functionally retarded due to emotional disorder; and those with damage of the brain structure. More flexibility is required within our relatively complex society so that dull people can adapt themselves, achieve acceptance, and find a vocation within their range of ability. There is need for improved services for the early diagnosis and treatment of emotional disturbances in children, and for counselling with parents of slow learning children to make the family climate as favorable as possible. Certain diseases which cause organic defects in the brain are now sufficiently well understood to make possible the prevention of mental retardation in persons with these diseases-cretinism and congenital syphilis among them. More recently, an increasing emphasis on the preventive approach to mental retardation has been made possible through our understanding of the effects of German measles in early pregnancy, knowledge of such metabolic errors as phenylketonuria and galactosemia, of kernicterus caused by Rh incompatibility between mother and child, as well as by our increased knowledge of human genetics.

Achievement↗

PubMed1958

Initial therapeutic trial of MA-307 in chronic human amoebiasis.

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Amebiasis↗

PubMed1957

Control of diarrheal diseases in California state hospitals for retarded children.

The three California state hospitals for mentally retarded persons have been having a severe problem with amebic and bacillary dysentery and with other infectious diseases of the gastrointestinal tract. At Sonoma, the oldest of these hospitals, this problem is known to have existed for many years. Improved medical and nursing staffing and the use of antibiotics and other effective drugs developed in recent years have greatly lowered morbidity and mortality rates in these institutions. However, in themselves these measures have not been effective in lowering the incidence of infection. Studies have demonstrated that mass treatment of cottage groups known to have a high incidence of amebic infection has resulted in control of this disease where such mass treatment was followed by adequate laboratory follow-up, with isolation and retreatment of treatment failures. Where mass treatment of such groups has been carried out without such laboratory followup, there was a rapid return to the previous high incidence of infection. Statistics show that these diseases are a serious threat to employees working in these institutions. Increasing attention is being paid to the potential threat to the surrounding communities and the state as a whole from the focus of infection present in these hospitals.

Amebiasis↗

PubMed1956