[A study of health status of school children 100 years ago]

In the years 1891 and 1892 an extensive study was carried out to determine the health of Norwegian school children. It was the first of its kind in the country. 16 middle schools and secondary schools from different parts of the country participated. The large majority of the children were between 12 and 16 years old, most of them from the social middle class. The plan was to study each pupil three times, in December 1891, in May 1892, and in August 1892. A total of 2,457 examinations were performed amongst 930 boys and 1,340 among 616 girls. The average age of menarche was 14.3 years. Height and weight were of course much lower than for Norwegian children today, but compared favourably with the situation elsewhere in Europe at that time. The symptoms and signs of disease recorded were headache, iron deficiency anaemia, gastrointestinal complaints (mostly recurrent abdominal pain), scoliosis, epistaxis, varying nervous complaints and a few other disorders. As a result of the study it was decided to appoint school physicians to every school, and to improve the physical education of the pupils.