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27
This recommendation and the policy based on it are to a large
extent responsible for the shortage of maternity beds. The Reports
of the London Maternity Services Joint Committee in 1943 and of
the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynæcologists, 1944, take
another view and recommend Maternity Units large and small,
separate or associated with hospitass, according to the needs of
the area. It is hoped that these recent influential reports may so
modify the official outlook on this question that the Alexandra
Maternity Home will have a long and useful life in the service of this
Borough with the whole-hearted approval and co-operation of the
Ministry of Health and Middlesex County Council.
The Alexandra Maternity Home opened on October 1st, 1943,
and received 22 patients in the three months up to December 31st.
In 1944 the number of occupied beds had reached 17 when the flyingbomb
phase of aerial war began and evacuations from London took
place. The Home remained open for those mothers who, in spite of
the dangers from the air, wished to remain near their homes.
The Obstetric Surgeon to the Home is Dr. J. R. Harris and the
Matron is Miss G. M. Howell, S.R.N., S.C.M.
Dr. Mathias resigned from her duties as Ante-natal Medical Officer
at No. 1 Centre (Town Hall) on her retiring from practice in this
district. Dr. Harris accepted an invitation to take this work and also
the Ante-natal Clinic at No. 4 Centre (Coldfall). Thus one-half of
the ante-natal work at the Council's Centres is done by the Obstetric
Surgeon at the Maternity Home.