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patients being nursed at home. The articles will be stored at suitable
centres in each area."
The Middlesex branch of the British Red Cross Society have operated
the scheme on behalf of the County Council since November, 1951.
The scheme provides that the equipment in the list approved by the
County Council shall be readily available throughout the county, and
that any necessary articles of equipment not readily available from the
existing store of the Red Cross Society will be supplied in the first instance
by the County Council on the understanding that the articles remain the
property of the County Council and shall be replaced if necessary out
of hire charges received. The Red Cross Depot in this area is that at
9, Peterborough Road, Harrow (Byron 2555) which is open on week
days from 9.30 a.m. to 1 p.m. and from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m.
2. Midwifery and Maternity Nursing
Within 35 years of the profession of the midwife being recognised,
it was in effect nationalised. In the earlier years of this century most
mothers in this country were confined in their own homes, being attended
by midwives. A number were attended by general practitioners who
were often helped by maternity nurses who were usually non-resident
and who were either midwives or those who had been trained only as
maternity nurses. The remuneration of the midwife was low, sometimes
very low so that many midwives had to attend on many women
to enable them to make a living and in these circumstances had not
much time for the nursing needed in the days after the confinement. In
some areas the impossibility of anyone earning a living as a midwife
meant that there was no one to provide this service. The service provided
in this way by the independent midwife was supplemented in many
areas by the activities of the nurse-midwives maintained by voluntary
district nursing associations, and in some localities by midwives or
medical students in training. To get over the shortcomings of these
arrangements, the Midwives Act of 1936 made it the responsibility of
local supervisory authorities to see that there were enough midwives
practising domiciliary midwifery in their areas to attend on women to
be confined in their homes. An authority could do this either by itself
appointing midwives, or by arranging with local nursing associations
for the work to be done by their staff. The effect in time of the setting
up of the authority service was that the independent midwives ceased to
practice. In Harrow the local nursing association provided a nursing
but not a midwifery service, and the Harrow Council which was at that
time the local supervisory authority for midwives had therefore to appoint
its own staff. This it did very largely by selecting from those who were
at the time practising as independent midwives in the district. The
National Health Service Act transferred to the local health authorities
the responsibility of maintaining the service and seeing: " that the
number of certified midwives employed who are available in the authority's
area for attendance on women in their homes as midwives or as maternity
nurses during child birth and for time to time thereafter during a period
not less than the lying-in period is adequate for the needs of the area."
The service then passed in 1948 to the hands of the Middlesex County