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13
is possible to provide only basic requirements in some cases and
minimal help to those with relatives close at hand.
The quality of care in the Home Nursing and Home Help
Services is under constant review and in spite of the restricted time
and finance available, attendances at lectures and inservice training
courses are being developed. As promised in an earlier report,
reappraisal of the work carried out by the Home Nursing Service
has been carried out and the evidence shows that the pattern of the
service is changing so that increased skills are needed. There is a
need for an additional male nurse and the number of enrolled
nurses and nursing auxiliaries employed is about right for the
service.
Mental Health Act 1959
The development of this service has continued on the principles
of policy which the Committee have approved from the initiation
of the service. Firstly a policy of primary prevention which accepts
the wider role of the Mental Health Officer as health educator to
the family and in a wider sense to the community. Secondly, a
policy of full integration with the Hospital, the Special Clinics and
General Medical Practitioner services by attachment of experienced
officers. The report shows how rapidly these policies have been
implemented to enable social support for the mentally disordered
patient and family to be maintained throughout the period of treatment
and after-care.
Co-operation with the voluntary associations, which is a twoway
process, has resulted in the setting up of a large number of
social clubs and the Mental Welfare officers have played a most
active part on the steering committees and subsequent committees
of management. The officers have also helped in a similar way
with two special playgroups set up in the Borough.
The report records the need for a Special Care Unit at the
Training Centre and this will be incorporated in the new Junior
Centre to be opened in 1969. The need for special medical supervision
of this Unit does not require qualification.
Stembridge Hall Day Centre, as the first mental health capital
project, appears in the report for the first time though opened in
September 1967. Over a period of nine months, out of 34 referrals,
only two patients relapsed and were re-admitted to hospital. This
high success rate was due to careful selection. Although the period
of review is short, it is clear that success in obtaining contracts for
industrial work and in providing a gateway to open employment
and social rehabilitation is being achieved through the enthusiasm
and ability of the supervisory staff at the Centre.
In the report for 1968, a review will be included of the work at
Rydal Mount, a fifteen place short stay hostel for the ex-mentally
ill patient which will be operational early in that year. This hostel