View report page

12
in 1906 was 103 per 1,000 live births. The lady appointed—Mrs.
Parnell—although not a trained nurse and at first, at least,
devoting only a portion of her time to health visiting, served the
community faithfully and well for twenty years, until her retirement
in 1927. During her first year of work as a health visitor,
the number of births in Wood Green was 1,282, and Mrs. Parnell
appears to have visited 1,211 of these babies, of whom she reported
that 854 were breast-fed.
This first health visitor carried on her work of visiting mothers
and babies in their homes unaided until 1915. when a qualified
nurse was appointed. A maternity centre was opened at the same
time in the School Clinic, White Hart Lane, by arrangement with
the Education Committee, and the nurse attended there on two days
each week, to interview expectant and nursing mothers, together
with infants and children under school age. No doctor was in
attendance but cases requiring medical advice were referred to the
Medical Officer of Health, if a private doctor was not available.
Attendances at this child welfare centre were so good that two years
later a second centre was opened in the Congregational Church Hall,
Lordship Lane. By 1919 there were three trained health visitors
on the Council's staff and two more child welfare centres had been
opened, and dental treatment for mothers and children under school
age was being provided. Hospital accommodation for maternity
cases had also been provided at the North Middlesex Hospital, by
arrangement with the Edmonton Board of Guardians. In the
previous year a day nursery had been opened at Stuart Villa to
take the place of one which had been functioning for several years
in Mayes Road.
In 1920 it was apparently felt that the work of maternity and
child welfare had made such progress—the attendances at the
centres in that year numbered 16,953—that the Council decided
to appoint a lady doctor to attend at the clinics. In March, 1921,
Dr. Aileen Boyd-Mackay, was appointed part-time Assistant
Medical Officer, to conduct one ante-natal and two infant welfare
clinics per week. Dr. Boyd-Mackay continued to serve Wood Green
both in child welfare and in school medical work for the next ten
years, during which time the work of both these services made