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LABORATORY FACILITIES.
Pathological and bacteriological work for the area
is carried out by the Kent County Council at the Public
Health Department, Sessions House, Maidstone, but as
there is still too much reliance placed on swabs for the
diagnosis of diphtheria, the postal delay has raised the
question of providing a small laboratory for such purposes
at the Health Department here, and this matter is
still being considered in the five year programme of
development.
MATERNITY AND CHILD WELFARE.
(i) Midwifery and Maternity Services.
(a) Ante-natal Care. 729 expectant mothers
attended the Corporation ante-natal clinics and received
ante-natal medical care, equal to a percentage of 51.0
of the notified births aginst 43.4 for 1937. It is known
that 312 other expectant mothers received ante-natal
care at clinics attached to maternity hospitals to which
they were admitted for confinement, and that 89 women
received ante-natal care from their own doctors prior to
admission to the Corporation Maternity Home, giving a
total percentage of 79.2, as compared with 65.1 in
1937, who received ante-natal medical care. This
increase is probably due to the new Midwives' service,
and to that service we look for a higher percentage in
future years. That the Midwives' service is not under
the Corporation is a matter for regret, as under those
conditions I am sure more midwives' cases would attend
the centres. That there are still many independent
midwives in the Borough is not the reason for only less
than half midwives' cases attending ante-natal clinics,
as many independent midwives do try to insist on their
cases attending.
Out of 122 births notified by county midwives in
(he first 6 months of 1938, only 31 per cent. of the
resnective mothers had attended the ante-natal clinics,
and out of 68 notified by independent midwives 41 per
cent, had attended.
(b) Co-operation with General Practitioners. 90 of
(he 479 cases admitted to the Corporation Maternity
Home during 1938, the first full year of its opening,
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