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In addition there were 4,682 visits paid where no reply was received.
With a view to increasing the degree of co-operation between the
Health Visitors and the local General Medical Practitioners arrangements
were made for the Health Visitors to meet the Doctors at the Town Hall,
Ilford, on an afternoon in April, 1954.
Day Nurseries.
(a) The hours of opening at all the Nurseries during 1954 continued
to be 7.30 a.m. to 6 p.m., Monday to Friday only.
(b) The standard charge for accommodation at the Day Nurseries continued
during 1954 to be 7/6 per child per day, with provision for this
charge to be reduced according to scale when the means of the parents do
not justify the full fee.
The marked decrease in the daily attendances at the Nurseries noted
last year has continued to be evident and accommodation has continued
to be made available to neighbouring Areas for children who can more
conveniently attend an Ilford Nursery than one in their own Area,
particularly those residing on the Hainault (L.C.C.) Estate.
In view of the low attendances, the Health Area Sub-Committee
decided that the staff at each Nursery should be reduced by one. The
appointments of two of the Deputy Matrons and one Nursery Nurse were
therefore terminated early in May, 1954, and the remaining Deputy Matron
is now transferred to the other two Day Nurseries, when required, to
take charge in the absence of the Matron.
(c) Stevens Road Day Nursery.—The premises occupied by this Day
Nursery until July, 1953, have now been transferred to the Ilford Committee
for Education, as from the 1st March, 1955, for use as a Cerebral
Palsy Unit which opened on the 2nd May, 1955.
(d) The training of Students at the Nurseries for the Certificate of the
National Nursery Examination Board continued. Three Students (one
from the Ley Street Nursery, one from the Sunshine House Nursery and
one from the Goodmayes Lane Nursery) entered for the examination during
the year all of whom obtained the Certificate.
The arrangements for young students to attend part-time courses (on
one day a week) at day continuation classes whilst awaiting enrolment
for the Nursery Nurses' Course at a Technical College in the September
following their sixteenth birthday also continued; this enables them to
pursue their studies in general subjects and so improve their general educaintional
standard during this pre-nursery course period. Three students
(one from each of the three Day Nurseries) attended such a course at the
St. George's Day Release Centre. Dagenham. in 1954.