View report page

108
infant death. rate would have been higher than it is.. 44 cases
were helped out of the fund during the year. One very nervous
mother, with a delicate, ill.nourished baby (born not long after
the first Air Raid) and a husband at the Front, has cost the fund
over 2, but she now says that she feels better than she has done
for years, and the baby is thriving. The other cases helped are
similar to this one. Every mother who is being helped out of this
fund is advised to bring her baby to be weighed once a week.
She is also visited at home.
" Work at the Child Welfare Centrde.—During the year, 2O2
infants were brought here to be weighed and for advice; their
total visits numbered 1,141. Two afternoons a week—Monday
and Thursday—are given up to this work. The mothers of their
own accord bring their children here, and are advised as to the
feeding, clothing, and general management of them, with very
encouraging results.
" It is often possible to ward oft premature hand.feeding by
giving the mother advice in time, and to prevent unnecessary
difficulties arising from hand.feeding by watching the children
week by week and carefully regulating their food.
" This branch of the Child Welfare Work is still growing, a
fact which would not have been possible but for the increased
accommodation provided for it at 44, Milton Road in the early
part of the year. The largest number of attendances on any one
of these afternoons was over 30.
"The work has, for some time, been greatly helped by the
valuable services of Dr. New, who gives his time on Thursday
afternoons. It is thus possible, not only to deal more thoroughly
with each child, but to detect the early symptoms of a child or
mother requiring medical treatment, and to see that this is
obtained from a medical practitioner or Hospital as soon as
possible.