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Seventy-two talks were given by health visitors to a variety of audiences. These
were in addition to those given by senior officers.
Subjects usually Chosen.
Hygiene in pregnancy
How a baby is born.
Preparing for baby.
Bathing baby.
Breast feeding.
Nutrition and diet.
Teeth, shoes, infectious diseases.
Home safety.
First Aid in the home.
All these talks were illustrated by filmstrips where appropriate.
It was then that a Film Library was commenced.
Few attempts were made to give talks during clinic sessions, as experience was
showing that these were often impracticable and difficult to organise.
Two health visitors attended a part-time course in Parentcraft Teaching, and
obtained their certificates.
1955-
To help demonstrations blackboards were introduced into the clinics, and were found
to be very useful. Other demonstration materials such as,
Flannelgraphs Home safety demonstration material
Birth Atlas
Demonstration shoes
were all supplied to each clinic.
Talks continued to be given to ready-made audiences outside the clinics.
At the invitation of the Matron, health visitors organised a series of talks to
groups of mothers attending the Plaistow Maternity Hospital Mothers' Club. Frequent
difficulty was found here, as so often, in that the mothers1 attention was distracted by
having to look after their toddlers.
Activities continued along the same lines. A catalogue giving information of all
visual aids available was issued to all staff.
Emphasis during this year was on the need to give Information to the public about
the link between lung cancer and the habit of smoking. There were certain conferences
between the Health Department and Education Department on how this information could be
given to the young people.
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