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39
Convalescent Treatment.
Convalescent Treatment was provided for eight nursing mothers with their babies
at the Shooters Hill Convalescent Home of the National League for Health Maternity
and Child Welfare; the Council reserved a bed at the Home for the summer months.
Full use was made of the provision, the bed being occupied for 24 weeks out of the
26 available.
Two of these mothers were experiencing difficulty with their breast milk, but were
so recuperated by their stay in the Home that breast feeding was wholly restored.
In addition to the above, six children under five years of age were sent to
convalescent homes.
INFECTIOUS DISEASE AMONG MOTHERS AND CHILDREN.
Only one case of puerperal fever was notified. The patient was removed to
hospital and soon afterwards died.
Ophthalmia Neonatorum.
During the year, 10 cases of ophthalmia neonatorum occurring in babies born
in the Borough were brought to our notice.
Six of the 10 cases were notified in accordance with the Public Health (Ophthalmia
Neonatorum) Regulations, 1914, four of the notifications being from hospitals, and
two from private medical practitioners.
Four of the cases were not notified by the doctor or midwife in attendance. In
one of these, a midwife was in attendance from an institution for training midwives,
and in a second case, a midwife from the same institution was in attendance as a
maternity nurse. Correspondence ensued with the Institution respecting nonnotification.
One of the non-notified cases came to our notice through the attendance
of the mother with her baby at the Council's Maternity Centre several weeks after
the birth. The baby was still suffering from discharge from the eyes, and as there
was evidence that the discharge had occurred within twenty-one days of birth, the
case was formally notified by the Medical Officer of the Centre, and arrangements
made for the removal of the patient to St. Margaret's Hospital. In the fourth
unnotified case the mother was attended at confinement by a midwife from the
Maternity Department of a General Hospital. The midwife sent a medical aid
notice in respect of a discharge from eye, to the Medical Officer of Health of the
London County Council, and the mother and child were removed to St. Margaret's
Hospital for treatment. Correspondence respecting the non-notification of this case
took place between the Public Health Department and the Lady Almoner of the
Maternity Department of the Hospital, the Midwives Supervising Authority and the
Ministry of Health. As a result of this correspondence, an expression of opinion was
obtained from the Ministry of Health that, notwithstanding any notice or information
which may be sent by a midwife to the Local Supervising Authority respecting a
purulent discharge from the eyes of an infant, such midwife is required to send a
notification to the Medical Officer of Health for the district, in accordance with
Article VI of the Public Health (Ophthalmia Neonatorum) Regulations, 1914, unless
the case has already been notified by a medical practitioner under Article 5 of these
Regulations.
Unless each case is notified to the Local Medical Officer of Health the public will
be ignorant of the real extent of the disease : the whole of the cases cannot be
followed up to ascertain the amount of permanent damage done to the eyesight.