The Midland Health Board received 1,199 allegations of child abuse last year, a reduction of 302 on the previous year.
Board investigators in Longford, Westmeath, Offaly and Laois subsequently confirmed 458 of the allegations. These involved 80 cases of physical abuse, 37 of sexual abuse, 108 cases of emotional abuse and 233 cases of neglect to children.
A breakdown of the 1,199 "non-accidental injury allegations" showed that there were 564 allegations of neglect, 269 allegations of physical abuse, 190 allegations of emotional abuse and 176 allegations of sexual abuse.
The report, which was presented to the last meeting of the Midland Health Board, said that a total of 118 of the allegations made were unfounded.
The breakdown of these unfounded allegations showed there were 25 false allegations of physical abuse, 16 of sexual abuse, 10 of emotional abuse and 68 of neglect.
A total of 442 of the allegations were what the board described as "suspected but not confirmed". Of these 122 related to physical abuse, 80 to sexual, 51 to emotional and 189 to neglect.
The number of cases which were still under investigation at the end of 1997 was 147 and of these the majority involved child neglect and 34 involved suspicion of sexual abuse.
The board was unable for one reason or another to investigate a further 28 cases. The majority of these related to alleged sexual abuse (10); nine of them related to neglect, two to emotional abuse and seven to physical abuse.
The figures also showed that six of the cases reported to it had been transferred to other health boards for investigation.
A spokeswoman for the health board said yesterday that the midland figures are broadly in line with other health boards in the Republic. She said that the board responded to allegations and had no waiting list for the investigation of allegations of child abuse or neglect.
The board, she said, provided health, welfare and personal services for 65,211 children under 18 years old in the four counties under its control.