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discharged sufficiently early to become, for a time, the responsibility
of a domiciliary midwife. These cases accounted for a total of
225 visits.
At the beginning of 1953 there were nine midwives on the
staff. During the year two midwives left, one to be married and the
other to take up a post in Indonesia. The approval of the County
Council was obtained to replace these midwives, although considerable
difficulty was experienced in filling both vacancies. Thanks
to the generosity of the Potters Bar Urban District Council, we
have obtained the provision of a flatlet, which has recently been
occupied by a full-time midwife. We are equally grateful to the
Urban District Council of Friern Barnet, where similar provision
has been made.
In addition to the nine midwives mentioned above, we usually
have two pupil midwives undergoing part of their training in the
Area. These are normally resident at ' Osidge,' where there is a
resident approved midwife teacher responsible for their training.
All our domiciliary midwives are subject to the supervision of
the Senior Assistant Medical Officer and the non-medical Supervisor
of Midwives. Our midwives are all qualified to administer
gas and air analgæsia All have the use of portable apparatus for
the administration of gas and air. In just over three out of four
cases attended by our midwives, gas and air analgaesia was given by
a midwife; in approximately three out of five cases, pethidine was
administered, again by a midwife.
The availability of transport for our midwives has been
adequate, due in large measure to the excellent fleet of cars handed
over to the County Council in 1948 by the Southgate Queen's
Nursing Association. Communication by telephone is provided in
the homes of all those midwives who are not resident at ' Osidge.'
9. Home Nursing Service
In addition to the Superintendent of Home Nurses, who is also
Non-medical Supervisor of Midwives, and the Superintendent at
' Osidge,' 21 whole-time and six part-time Home Nurses were
employed at the end of 1953. Owing to the sharp rise in the demands
on this service, the approved establishment for the Area was
increased during the year from 24 to 26.
During the year, our nurses paid a total of 77,335 visits to
3,140 cases. These cases were divided as follows :
Medical 2,612
Surgical 301
Infectious diseases 45
Tuberculosis 112
Maternal complications 45
Others 25
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