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An Ante-Natal Clinic is held at the White House every Friday
morning at 10 a.m. Expectant mothers are at this Clinic advised
as to how to keep themselves strong and healthy, for the sake of
the coming baby. In the later months of pregnancy a careful
watch is maintained over all circumstances that may affect the
confinement; and measures may be taken to render safe and easy
what, without such previous care, might prove a difficult,
obstructed, perhaps dangerous, labour. Much possible discomfort
in the later months of pregnancy is avoidable, and much anxiety
on the part of young mothers in their first pregnancies can be explained
away, to their great comfort and happiness; and such
explanations are part of the functions of the Ante-Natal Clinics.
The Health Visitors follow up cases requiring home supervision
after receiving medical advice at the Friday morning
Clinics, when that further precaution is considered advisable by
the Medical Officer. During 1926, 221 such visits to Ante-Natal
patients were made in their homes by the Health Visitors.

Mothers from East Ham under the care of the nurses at the
Maternity Charity and District Nurses' Home, Plaistow, or any
of its branches, or at Queen Mary's Hospital, Stratford, attend
the Ante-Natal Clinics of their own hospital. No cases attending
private doctors are examined at the White House Clinic, unless
such patients bring to the Medical Officer of the Clinic letters from
their doctors requesting- examination for purposes of consultation.
Maternity Accommodation.
No maternity scheme can be considered complete without the
provision of maternity beds for women who cannot suitably be
confined in their own homes. Under the Maternity and Child
Welfare Act, 1918, Local Authorities are empowered, with the
approval of the Ministry of Health, to make arrangements for the