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The Health and Welfare Officers visited 29 out of the 34 infants registered as born to city
residents during the year. The remaining five infants were traced to addresses outside the city
as the parents had subsequently removed to accommodation elsewhere.
Statistics for 1972 have been recorded in a more detailed format and present a fuller picture
of the health visiting content of the work undertaken by the staff: it also shows an increase of
home visits due to the larger residential population and includes visits to all age groups from
infancy to extreme old age.
One Health and Welfare Officer transferred her employment to another London Borough during
the early part of the year and two Health and Welfare Officers were appointed at a later date, thus
increasing the staffing establishment to one Principal Health & Welfare Officer and three field
staff. This made it possible to rearrange case loads and develop the health visitor attachment
to a General Practioners' Group Practice. It enabled staff to devote more time in seeking out
elderly people in need of health maintenance services and to provide the necessary supportive
social services. One Health and Welfare Officer was allocated to St. Bartholomews Hospital
Special Treatment Clinic for two sessions a week to assist in the contact tracing programme.
Another Health and Welfare Officer extended her role in assessment and provision of Health
and Welfare Services to men living in the Salvation Army Hostel. The development supports a
plan of the General Practitioner who now holds surgery sessions on three mornings a week in
the hostel in an attempt to meet the very real need of medical and community care found to be
present among many men lodging there.
As the child population grew, more mothers with infants attended the Child Health Clinic
in St. Bartholomews Hospital; this created a need for improved play facilities for the toddlers
within the clinic setting giving mothers the opportunity to talk to one another whilst the children
play.
Senior Nursing Officers from St. Bartholomews Hospital have been welcomed once more to
the Department, each spending one or two days observation visits in community care. Before the
year ended, two groups of eleven student nurses from the hospital also participated in observation
visits.
The Health and Welfare Officers not only carry out Health visiting duties but incorporate all
Social Works functions apart from the Mental Health and Child Care duties provided by Tower
Hamlets Social Services Department. Over the years since 1965, the two roles have gradually
merged into a whole and it is increasingly difficult for field staff to define the duties as separate
work functions. Many residents "in need" are found to require both services in fairly equal
measure and each service enhances the other to the benefit of the recipient. The year 1972 has
been one of consolidation and change to keep abreast of the steady increase in the population
and the need to adapt services and techniques to provide community care in specific areas of the
City where redevelopment has created new problems. To this must be added the growing awareness
of residents in the Temples to the Health and Social Service resources available to them, since the
Temples Order came into effect in November 1971.
Tuberculosis Health Visiting
1971 1972
Cases notified (residents) 9 13
Total home visits, old and new cases 32 26
Shops and office contact tracing
No. of investigations 16 18
(involving (involving 88
240 persons) persons + 165
Mass X-Rayed)
The volume of work in Tuberculosis health visiting has shown a slight increase and there
is continued need to support, educate and advise patients and their families. This continued
need is reflected in the work of contact tracing in shops and offices to enable City workers to
receive radiological examinations and to combat the spread of infection.
In the Salvation Army Men's Hostel, the casual occupants are frequently at high risk of
infection and some indeed have contracted the illness. In an attempt to reduce the spread of
infection the men are actively encouraged to use the facilities of the Mass X-Ray mobile van
which is now organised to make twice yearly visits outside the Hostel. The General Practioner
and the Health and Welfare Officer at the Surgery Sessions in the Hostel are constantly alerted
to the need to check and follow-up men who lapse in their Chest Clinic attendances.
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