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ante-natal clinics, The Nelson and St. Helier, apart from those
under private supervision, it will be appreciated that there
are not many women to-day in our area who do not receive
medical supervision throughout their pregnancies.
It will be seen by reference to Table VIII that the average
attendance at three of our ante-natal clinics is over 20 per
session. To achieve such an average means that attendances
at some of these sessions are regularly very considerably in
excess of 20 and it is these that must be considered to obtain
a true picture; in fact, attendances have been frequently in
excess of 40 per session although it appears that our responsibility
for this work may soon cease, some scatter of this
concentration is becoming urgent. It is greatly to the credit
of our Ante-Natai Officer that this increasing volume, of perhaps
the most important work in the whole field of piiblic
health, has been accomplished at, a standard which justly
entitles the authority to be proud of this service.
It will be seen from the figures given on page 32 that
at two of the infant welfare centres the average attendance
during the year is over 50 and in one case over 60. It ought
to be pointed out that at the Morden Clinic which shows an
actual average attendance of 31.9 that one session originally
set aside for Diphtheria Immunisation shows so few attendances
that it practically does not count as a session and to
get a proper picture of the attendance picture there, the average
should be based on 100 sessions not on 150 as calculated
in the report. This would give an average attendance of .47.8.
As 1 have pointed out with regard to the ante-natal sessions,
where an average number of attendances is 50, there will be
many sessions greatly in excess of this number. This is
important, as the reputation of the clinics depends on the
reactions of the individuals attending and at a mother's first
attendance, perhaps her only attendance—if the number is
overwhelmingly large so that she is unable to secure an uninterrupted
private audience with the Health Visitor for a
reasonable length of time, she is deprived of a service which
it is our function to provide. It is important, therefore, to
keep constantly in mind that if the standard of service is to
be maintained, staffing arrangements must keep pace with
attendances.
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