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To the St. Helier County Hospital 108
To other hospitals 8
The reasons for referring these cases were as follows:—
For obstetric abnormality 68
For other medical reasons 41
For unsuitable home conditions 7
Puerperal fever cases, if arising in a hospital in the area or
in domiciliary practice are treated at the Wandle Valley
Isolation Hospital. Last year they admitted one such case from
our area.
Emergency Maternity Unit, There were no calls made on
this unit during the year under review.
Consultant Service. An obstetric specialist's opinion is
available to any general practitioner in cases of difficulty or
complicated labour, for any emergency in pregnancy or in the
puerperium. Originally started under the Puerperal Pyrexia
Regulations, the scope of this service has been extended to enable
any general practitioner to call in the assistance of a specialist,
for any danger associated with childbirth which threatens the
welfare of the mother.
Home Help Scheme. The Home Help Scheme has grown with
the increasing availability of suitable women for the work. In
the past, the impossibility of recruiting Home Helps has been
the limiting factor in the extent to which the scheme was capable
of operating. Now that recruitment is somewhat easier, our
difficulties in this respect have been correspondingly lightened.
At the present time we have two full time and 19 part time
home helps and, as will be seen from the appended table,
assistance in the home was provided for 90 homes for maternity
and child welfare reasons and for 71 homes where justification
was old age, sickness or infirmity. It will be remembered that
these latter types of cases have only recently been included and
that prior to 1944 the Home Help Service was only available to
homes where there was a pregnant or parturient mother or
children under five years of age.
The value of this service is cases of chronic sickness and
infirmity cannot be over estimated. The extent of the help given
is probably not generally realised any more than the extent of
the helplessness of the chronic sick. In many of these cases the
Home Help has to wash and bedpan them.
This may well be the nucleus of future schemes for the
betterment of conditions for the aged, and when we have turned
all the Unions and Poor Law Institutions into offices, we shall,
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