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and enquiry and is carried out in close co-operation with Probationer Officers and other
social workers engaged in this field.
In April, 1958, at the request of the Governors of St. Mary's hospital, a full-time
female welfare officer was appointed to attend the clinic and to follow-up defaulters and
contacts. Good results in securing attendance at the chnic have been obtained.
Health education—Over the past ten years there has been a considerable development in
health education. Its most important single constituent during the whole of this period
has certainly been the direct approach made to individual members of the public by the
staff of the department in the course of their duties and, of course, the health visitor
in this respect, as in so many others, is the mainspring of activity. Reference has already
been made elsewhere in this review to her activities and to the support that she receives
by the provision of health education material suitable to the occasion.
Some general and a number of particular aspects of health education should be
considered.
As part of its proposals under section 28 of the National Health Service Act, 1946,
the Council submitted a proposal to develop " a comprehensive educational programme
in physical and mental health " and to seek the co-operation of the borough councils
and to utilise the services of the Central Council for Health Education and other
appropriate bodies.
In furtherance of this objective, in 1952 the existing arrangements for health
education were reviewed and, concurrently, working parties studied educational
activities in maternity and child welfare centres and the prevention of accidents in the
home.
The review indicated that the metropolitan borough councils concentrated on
propaganda in connection with the services remaining under their control and the
Council on the personal health services. It was recognised that the most efficacious
approach was through informal talks and discussions by the health visitor and that the
expansion of activities in the welfare centres should receive every encouragement.
It was decided that a concentrated annual campaign should be carried out in an endeavour
to bring home to Londoners the need to prevent the heavy toll of health and life caused
by accidents in the home.
Advisory
panel
Questions of policy in this field have always been decided by the Health Committee
of the Council. In 1954 a health education advisory panel was set up inside the department
which represents the main professional points of view, both central and divisional,
and which for some two years, because of the very great importance of health education
in schools, has had the assistance of the head of a large secondary modern school. The
panel sits regularly and the principal medical officers responsible respectively for
school health and maternity and child care act as chairman and vice-chairman. Other
persons inside and outside the Council's service are invited to join its deliberations as
appropriate. A small committee of field workers under the chairmanship of a senior
nursing officer, who is also a member of the advisory panel, acts as a permanent health
education working team.
Divisional medical officers are responsible for the day to day arrangements for health
education in their own divisions. A very wide selection of subjects are covered and
there were in 1958 3,499 educational sessions in welfare centres with attendances of
40,597 as against 1,601 and 21,779 in 1949.
Annual
campaigns
Centrally organised county-wide campaigns to encourage diphtheria immunisation
have been held annually throughout the whole of the period and generally they have
been followed by an increase in the acceptances for primary inoculations. It is
considered essential to keep this important matter before the public.
The prevention of accidents in the home has formed the subject of a similar
campaign which has been held in the autumn of each year since 1954. It is appreciated
that a considerable and well sustained effort in this field will be necessary before any
obvious improvement is likely.