London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972
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Hints from the Health Department. Leaflet from the archive of the Society of Medical Officers of Health. Credit: Wellcome Collection, London
West Ham 1950
[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for West Ham]
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continued unabated,, In the absence of a Nurses" Home or of any kind of living accommodation
which can be offered to prospective applicants, recruitment has been practically limited to
part-time staff. Many of these are married women with home ties and all the uncertainties
which follow from them; and some are not fully qualified as nurses. All give loyal and
creditable service, and the table below shows how much they accomplish, but a service built
on such foundations is obviously dangerously insecure. Recognising this the Council took a
far reaching and constructive step to overcome the difficulties by including a proposal to
build a District Nurses' Home and headquarters in their programme of capital works for 1951*
It is hoped that this project will succeed in attracting permanent whole-time nurses with
appropriate qualifications to come and work in the borough. It may well be the only way
of securing a stable and adequate service„
Home Nursing Staff on 31st December, 1950 •
1 C.M.B*
employed full-time
4 S.R.N.
4 S.E.A.N.
1 Nursing Orderly
employed part-time.
Summary of the Work carried out by the Home Nurses.
| Total cases attended. | Total number of visits paid. | Average number of visits per case. |
|---|---|---|
| 2,4l4 | 60,499 | 25.06. |
SECTION 26, VACCINATION AND IMMUNISATION.
See pages 5 and 8.
SECTION 27 - AMBULANCE SERVICE,
The service continues to function as in the previous year. Ambulances under the
operational control of the Chief Officer of the Fire Brigade are based at fire stations
and the transport depot. Sitting case cars are provided by the Borough Engineer from the
Council^ fleet of passenger cars and are under the operational control of the Ambulance
Officer at the Health Department.
The deployment of operational vehicles is as follows;-
Ambulances.
Stratford Fire Station 1
Plaistow Fire Station 4
Silvertown Fire Station 1
Transport Depot 5
Sitting Case Cars.
Transport Depot 12
The demands on the Ambulance Service in 1950 were higher than during 1949 but as
the year progressed it could be seen that the calls for both ambulances and sitting case
cars were shewing a tendency to become fairly steady. This was especially so in the case
of ambulances which were also shewing some signs of seasonal fluctuations.
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