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STILLBIRTHS
There were no domiciliary stillbirths during the year.
TRAINING
All of the Council's ten full-time midwives are approved by the Central Midwives Board
as teaching district midwives to train pupil midwives for the three months'district experience
that is required in the second period of their training. The Council accepts pupil midwives
from the City of London Maternity Hospital and St. Mary's Hospital, Paddington. During 1968,
35 pupils completed their district experience and a further 8 were in training at the end of
the year.
Owing to the decline in domiciliary confinements some difficulty was experienced in
obtaining the required number of home confinements for pupil midwives. As a result of this,
the Central Midwives Board introduced a new scheme of training requiring pupils to have six
domiciliary confinements plus a programme of social services and community care - these were
arranged by the Borough. The programme includes visits to day nurseries, training schools, a
mother and baby home, a magistrate's court, the headquarters of the London Ambulance Service
and the Citizens' Advice Bureau. Talks are given by representatives of the Chief Welfare
Officer and of the Children's Officer on the work of their departments, also by the senior
social worker (Health Services), the principal mental health social worker, the deputy
principal nursing officer, a home help organiser and a public health inspector.
HEALTH VISITING
Health Visitors have continued their work with families of all social classes. There has
been a great deal of movement of families during the year and tracing these families is
difficult and time-consuming. In certain instances we use the "lost families circular" which
is circulated to all London boroughs.

For some years now we have known of the "battered baby syndrome". With greater awareness
by hospitals, general practitioners and health visitors, more of these distressing cases come
to notice year by year. They need a great deal of investigation to begin with and careful
vigilance for quite a time afterwards. The hospitals, general practitioners and health
visitors are working in close contact with each other here.
During the year 1968, triplets were born in Islington in a family where there were three
children already. The children were all over five pounds in weight and developed normally.
The mother, however, felt exhausted although she had some private domestic help. The health
visitor, therefore, arranged for the services of a home help to give two hours help daily
and both father and mother expressed the view that without frequent visits by the health
visitor and the home help service, routine in their full and active household could never
have been established. The family have since moved from the Borough.
The health visitors took part in a number of surveys.
Ten health visitor students were trained in the Borough and all passed. The Borough
sponsored eight health visitor students during the year.
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