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  4. Mid 50s Health Mystery

Mid 50s Health Mystery

A Memory of Hounslow.

I just wonder if anyone else who lived in Hounslow ever attended the Health Clinic in the Bath Road (next to the RC Church and mid way between Hounslow High Street and the Sutton Lane/Wellington Road North junction). I am writing my life story for my grandchildren and other future generations and I have a clear memory of attending the clinic for "light treatment". I would have been about 5 - 7 years old. In a group of similar aged children we all stripped off to our underpants and donned goggles to sit on stools in a room around what I presume was an ultraviolet light source. I know I went a few times. It seems it may have been a rickets prophylactic treatment - I know I never actually had rickets but was very thin (naturally - my dad was the same) but healthy as a horse. If anyone else remembers having this treatment and does know exactly what it was for, I would be VERY interested in hearing from you - or even if you had it but don't know why.

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Added 14 September 2012

#238100

Comments & Feedback

Hello Susan! I went to that clinic but in the 70s when I was first married. I was very interested to read about these 'treatments' as a retired nurse. They seem to be known as 'Sunray' treatments and were thought beneficial for children who were deemed to be 'frail'. There is quite a lot of information on the internet about the different ones used - apparently they used infra-red as well as ultaviolet - for anything from vitamin D deficiency to ringworm!
By kebeadle on Tue Oct 14th 2014, at 7:55 am
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Yes Susan I went to this clinic to have dental treatment with the full gas mask, and woke up feeling very ill, as did most people I suppose. I was born in 1946 so these visits would have been in the 50s Good Luck Warren Stutely nickname Bunny
By warrenstutely on Sun Jan 11th 2015, at 1:08 pm
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yes I did, I was also born in 1946 and I remember
having eight milk teeth out there (gas) and they were absolutely horrible to me, I had nightmares about it for years.
By Deborah Englander on Sun Aug 16th 2015, at 1:26 pm
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I was born in 1947 and went to Cranford Primary. I went to the Bath Road Clinic for all my vacinations and the denist. Who remembers the small dishes of dolly mixtures we could choose from afterwards? And then there was the "conveyor belt" dentist where they used to give you gas, extract a tooth, put a pad in your mouth to stop the bleeding and send you to sit on a bench in the next room until it had stopped. Jackie Hart (née Warne).
By jackiehart on Sun Sep 6th 2015, at 3:30 pm
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Yes and, for years, the nurse who looked after you until the bleeding stopped was a Nurse Bentley.
By Adrian Read on Thu Sep 17th 2015, at 1:10 pm
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I never went into the clinic but I used to catch the bus at the stop directly outside it, (1960-66) and I can remember the poster there warning about the dangers of smoking, featuring Nick o'Teen - I think it was one of the very earliest campaigns against smoking.
By kmchell on Thu May 19th 2016, at 9:55 am
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Ionly had one awful dentist experience there, after that my mum took me to a private dentist. I heard they were all trainee dentists and practiced on our milk teeth for no good reason!
By valreng on Mon May 7th 2018, at 8:16 am
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I wrote earlier about the eight milk teeth, they were brutal about other things as well.
I then went to a very gentle dentist in Twickenham but still get panic attacks at the Dentist
now at the age of 72.
By Deborah Englander on Tue Oct 16th 2018, at 10:32 am
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I also had teeth removed there they were awful still remember mask going over my mouth
Put me off going to dentist for years
By Caryl Ohara on Tue Dec 1st 2020, at 7:50 am
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