[Report 1923] / Medical Officer of Health, Halifax County Borough.

  • Halifax (England). County Borough Council. nb2008024085.
Date:
1923
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1923] / Medical Officer of Health, Halifax County Borough. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Number of notified births attended by Midwives 646 Number of notified births attended in St. Luke’s Maternity Home ... ... ... 174 Number of notified births attended in St. Luke’s Hospital ... ... ... ... 54 Number of notified births attended in other institutions ... ... ... ... 40 Notifications from Midwives* of sending for Medical help ... ... ... 108 Notifications from Midwives of intention to resort to artificial feeding ... ... 9 Comparing the notified live births with the registered births, it will be noticed thait i 17 were not notified, which points to continued negligence with regard to this obliga- tion. The ratio of notified birt,hfe to registered births is about the spme as for 1922. The omission to notify a birth may make a great difference to the welfare of the child concerned, as an un-notified case fnay not receive a visit from a health visitor for two months or more and may have suffered meantime because of the lack of advice concerning nurture and feeding which it is the health visitor’s duty to give. Where a case is botifiedj, it is the duty of the health visitor to call as soon as the doctor or midwife in charge of the case has ceased to attend. Un-notified cases reach us at a much later date per Register of Births. It is often about this time, when the mother is resuming her household duties, that the breast milk may seem tO' be insufficient to satisfy the child, and she is perplexed as to the best course to take, i.e., wlhetiher to try to supplement her scanty supply by small quantities of diluted milk given by spoon, bottle, or to wean the child entirely. Our health visitors are often able to give helpful counsel at this time in favour of persevering with Breast Feeding even though the mother cannot entirely satisfy the child. The old erroneous idea that mother’s milk and some other form of diluted milk “ will not mix' ” has still to be combated. It is very encouraging to report that breast feeding entirely or in part, is increasingly practised by the mothers in the Halifax Borough. The Senior Health Visitor, Miss Olram, has worked out the following figures from the records kept at the Centres