View report page

Relaxation and Mothercraft Classes
This service is now operating in three Hornsey and three Tottenham
clinics and is much appreciated by expectant mothers. The group
teaching is in all cases given by a health visitor whose aim is to dispel
fears associated with pregnancy and confinement and to instruct
mothers on those matters associated with the well-being of themselves,
normal childbirth and the preparation for the care of their children.
The classes are kept as informal as possible and time is allowed for
questions and answers as well as for a cup of tea. Many mothers return
post-natally for exercises and to consult the health visitor.
Notification of Births—Home and Institutional Confinements
It will be observed from the table set out below that more than 80 per
cent. of the births which occurred last year were in hospital and nursing
homes.
The number of home confinements has dropped steadily since the
peak birth rate year of 1947. It is interesting to note that this drop
continued over the last three years even though the number of births
has remained fairly steady.
It would appear that while the hospitals are able to provide a sufficient
number of beds for maternity cases, mothers are being discouraged from
having their babies at home, especially as it is less expensive for them to
go into hospital. Because of the lack of discrimination in favour of
admission to hospital on purely obstetric or social grounds difficulty
sometimes arises in finding a bed in an emergency, as all hospital
accommodation has been taken up.
The number of institutional confinements in Hornsey is undoubtedly
increased by the existence in that borough of the Alexandra Maternity
Home which accommodates over 600 Hornsey births each year. In
Tottenham, on the other hand, there is evidence that hospital accommodation
is more limited and is always taken up. The Tottenham patients
make use largely of the North Middlesex Hospital and the Mothers,
Hospital, Clapton. These, together with the Alexandra Maternity
Home, take nearly two-thirds of the institutional births of the area, and
with all of them there is close co-operation. The majority of the
remainder of the institutional confinements take place in hospitals in
Central London, although some 47 mothers were last year confined at
private or voluntary assisted nursing homes in Hornsey.
The trend to hospital confinements is a National one and the Minister
of Health issued a circular on the subject in August, 1951, stating that
though it was not possible to lay down a proportion of births for which
hospital or maternity home beds should be provided, in general,
hospital provision is required on medical or social grounds for about
half the confinements. In this area well over half of the confinement
are in institutions but at the same time some of the 17 per cent. of
60