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Show Polio Care Community Problem Says Leader; Home Care in Non-paralytic Polio Urged Despite encouraging progress in polio research, all communities communi-ties must be on the alert and fully prepared to cope with polio outbreaks this summer, Ray Knell, chairman of the Iron County chapter of th National Foundation for Infantile Paraly-sis, Paraly-sis, reported today. Mr. Knell has just returned from a workshop meeting of more than 170 volunteers of the National Foundation county chapters in Salt Lake City, where problems and progress in the polio fight were reviewed with Basil O'Connor, president of the March of Dimes organization, and other pilo officials. Emphasizing that no polio vaccine vac-cine is ready for use this summer sum-mer and that gamma globulin, the blood derivative found effective ef-fective as a temporary preventive of paralytic polio, is in critically short supply, Mr. Knell reported that polio probably will present much the same priblem this summer as In the recent past. He pointed out that national incidence of the disease this year is already running about 25 per cent ahead of the same period per-iod in 1952 the worst year in recorded polio history, with 57,629 cases reported across the country. Fortunately, he added, we are all so much more aware of polio po-lio symptoms these days that, we can count on early diagnosis and prompt treatment. And many cases will be "suspected" or nonparalytic ones which often can be diagnosed and treated just as well in their own homes as in hospitals. Dr. Kenneth S. Landauer, assistant as-sistant medical director, explained ex-plained that the treatment trend today emphasizes certain advantages advan-tages of home care for such patients, pa-tients, especially those living near treatment centers, Mr. Knell said. "With the aid of a consultant, if necessary, the family physician physi-cian often can diagnose and care for these patients at home, sparing spar-ing them fatigue, nervous tension ten-sion and excitement brought on by hospitalization," he added. "Home care avoids the psychological psycho-logical disadvantages of separation separa-tion from the family and the difficult adjustment to a strange environment. And, most important, import-ant, it eases the strain on hospitals hospi-tals during epidemics, releasing beds and professionally trained personnel more urgently needed to care for the really serious cases." National Foundation chapters across the country, already carrying car-rying a heavy burden of continuing contin-uing care for an estimated 60,000 pjatients strcken with polio po-lio in previous years, must now make ready for the unknown numbers who will be added to the active caseload this year, Mr. Knell emphasized. "No one can forestall the actual ac-tual number of new cases that will be added to the patient lists of our own chapter," he continued. contin-ued. "But the National Founda- tion will not fail any child or I adult who needs help." |