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provides the medical and health visiting staff. The
Clinics at the Centres are of two kinds: (1) ante-natal,
and (2) post-natal or infant welfare clinics.
The Ante-natal Clinics. (Clinics for the care of
the expectant mother).—Three sessions per week are
devoted to this purpose, two at the Greyhound Road
Centre attended by Dr. Ruby Thomson, and one at
Wandsworth Bridge Road under Dr. Dorothy Stewart.
The work is co-ordinated with that of the Council's
Maternity Home, of which Dr. Thomson is in charge,
and it aims at the prevention and early diagnosis of the
complications of pregnancy and childbirth and the
reduction of maternal and infantile mortality. With
a more efficient midwifery service and extension of
ante-natal work much suffering and invalidism among
women and many infantile deaths, especially of infants
under a month, could be prevented. Midwives recommend
a considerable number of patients to the antenatal
Centres and medical reports are sent to them
on their cases. The midwives are also informed as
to the subsequent progress of their patients.
Many private doctors have little opportunity for
doing ante-natal work, as the majority of the midwifery
cases are now attended by midwives. If treatment
of the patients attending the clinics is found
to be necessary they are referred to a doctor or to a
hospital with a written statement of the case, and if
special treatment is required, which cannot be obtained
privately, the patients are referred to a hospital or
special department, e.g., obstetrical, gynecological or
venereal diseases department.
The Post-natal Clinics.—The functions of these
clinics are the care of infants and children up to school
age and of nursing mothers. The women and children
attend the clinics usually weekly or fortnightly and
are visited in their homes by the health visitors and
nurses.
These centres differ from out-patient departments
of children's hospitals, which are intended primarily
for the treatment of sick children, whereas infant