Call the health visitor

The phone rang yesterday, and when I answered it an unfamiliar voice said, “Hello, is that Eilidh’s mum?”

My one-year-old daughter doesn’t tend to know a lot of people that I don’t know, so I admit I was a little thrown as I answered yes.

The nice lady on the phone then explained that she is a health visitor in our area, and that she was calling because they’d had notification that Eilidh had attended A&E at the weekend.

I assured her that everything was ok and that Mouse has a bad ear infection but really we were only there cos the OOH doc sent us and we just needed some antibiotics. These things always seem to happen at the weekend.

There are notices everywhere at A&E saying that your health visitor will be informed, and it’s really nice that they call and check up (although, thinking about it, we’ve had Arran at A&E three times with breathing difficulties, two of those arriving by ambulance, and they’ve never phoned before… ) I’m glad that we are part of a system where the children are being looked after.

It’s not foolproof by any means. How much could she really tell from talking to me on the phone?  I do also know that some of the children my mum fosters have been with families that are ‘known’ to their local health visitor and it still has taken, in some cases, years for them to be removed from an abusive or neglectful situation.

It’s a start, though, and I do think that most health visitors are at least well meaning. I’ve been surprised, however, by how disliked they are by quite a lot of mothers, and I’ve been trying to work out why.

I think partly it is because they give out advice, and even although mothers often go to them for just that, being told anything about your baby is often enough to get any mother’s hackles rising. When you’re a mum – especially a new mum – people are so keen to shove their oar in give well-meaning advice and sometimes it can feel like a health visitor is just one of those people.

A friend’s husband 'banned' her from seeing the health visitor, as he said that she would leave the house a confident woman with a healthy baby and come back with an over/under weight baby who wasn’t rolling over/sitting up/clapping hands on cue yet. I think that perhaps some health visitors set too much store by centiles and charts and lines and mums then see the health visitor as someone who makes them feel bad about the thing that they are most invested in and most proud of. Perhaps some (definitely not all!) health visitors could do with learning how to boost mums confidence rather than bring it down.

With Arran, I went to the baby clinic every fortnight, had him weighed, fretting if he’d gained less than expected and rejoicing over every gram of fat on his (frankly perfectly chunky) little form. With Eilidh, she was weighed till she was ten days old (and that was because they came to my house every day with a set of scales!) and on day ten she hadn’t quite gained what she was ‘supposed’ to (damn, don’t these babies ever read the books?) and I just said I was happy with that and persuaded the midwife to discharge us. I’ve never taken her to baby clinic. One of the blessings of being a second time mum is that I can just look at her and go, ‘Yep, she’s fine’.

Having said all that, I really do feel happy that we live in a country where health visitors exist. When Arran turned two, they phoned up to arrange for me to take him in for a check up. This was inconvenient as I had a new baby, so I declined and said that I was confident that his development was fine. They weren’t happy about this, so agreed to come to the house. When the (very lovely) health visitor arrived, I asked her politely why this check was felt to be so necessary, and she pointed out that for families like us, it’s not necessary but that they have to make sure that they see all of the families, so that nobody falls through the net.

Some people see it as stifling and big brother-ish – another sign of the nanny state. I just think it’s nice. I’m really lucky to be in a position to not need the help of a health visitor, and I’d rather be swept up in a big net and let go again after a bit of wasted time than have any mums out there, floundering and having no safety net at all.

So, power to the health visitors I say. There’ll be some good ones and some bad ones – as in any profession – I'm sure, but I’m glad they exist.  

Comments

[Amy]

And there is the fact that it is the good old NHS that does it - there are probably millions of parents less assured less confident and far more relient on these people than you who genuinly 'need' the service

Great blog again.

[Housewivesincorporated.blogspot.com]

I have mixed feelings about Health Visitors. With Little Moo (my first child) I religiously went to the weekly weighing clinic for about 6 weeks until I decided it was an utter waste of time. I never actually saw a HV at all. I had to queue for ages (sometimes in the rain), undress my poor newborn down to NAKED, weigh her myself and record the weight in a book. That, to me, was a pointless exercise.
No one even missed us or bothered to follow up. It struck me at the time that this is probably how so many abused or otherwise neglected babies fall through the cracks.

When Ole was born 6 months ago I never bothered to go to the clinic at all. Ever. Like you've said, now that I'm a 2nd time mum I trust my gut instinct about my child/rens welfare.

I can say, though, that after suffering with PND my GP put me in touch with a Health Visitor (I really didn't hold out much hope) but was pleasantly surprised by the level of support she provided. She visited me at home every few weeks initially (the gap between visits increasing as I improved) and would spend an hour one-on-one just talking, listening, and offering ideas for further support where appropriate.

If I ever have more children I still won't bother going to the weighing clinics etc but I won't have such a negative view on Health Visitors and the other support services they offer.

[Meg]

I am so happy to read a positive attitude towards health visitors, i do get quite sick of the general negative feelings towards health visitors that seems the norm among mums these days.

My Mum was a health visitor for many many years, and an excellent one (i'm not just saying this, she was chosen to observed by the Chief of Nursing during a study and has a personally written letter commending her on the work she was doing at the time in her community) - and so i was amazed when i became a mum myself that the attitudes towards health visitors can be so negative.

I have talked about this with my Mum many times, it's something that saddens her greatly. The sad fact is that like so many NHS staff these days, their numbers have been cut back so much that they are now often over worked, under supported and rarely get the chance for on going training unless its in their own precious spare time. This sadly means that despite the individual health visitors best efforts, the service is being effected negatively. This is what happens when people are over worked, underpaid and under valued.

I also think parents need to accept that if we want to stop children being abused then we need to have people checking up on them, and that means OUR children too, child abusers don't go around with a sign around their neck after all. I don't think many people really realize that among all the other support and services Health Visitors provide, this one thing is perhaps the most valuable, keeping our children safe.

(Steps down off soap box)

Great post Eleanor!

[Claire]

Wonderful post! I have never understood why so many mothers HATE health visitors, and ignore every bit of their advice, even in situations where a babies health is at actual risk (losing way too much weight for example). But then I have always had brilliant experiences with my health visitors, and when they have given advice that I wasn't sure about, I would find a happy medium between their suggestions and my gut feeling.

We are exceptionally lucky to have health visitors in this country, and many children are also very lucky we have health visitors.

[Gill Penny]

Health visitors, like the rest of the NHS are national treasures. Those who resent them haven't lived in countries where health care is either
exorbitantly expensive or practically non-existent. Three cheers for for the NHS - and in this case, especially the health visitors.

[BabyBonzo]

Just to give a contrary view the Health Visitor who visited me when my little boy was just over a week old made me feel awful. When I told her that my baby wouldn't sleep all day no matter what I did she looked at me like I was crazy, made me put my baby in the buggy and leave him there crying his head off for over 20 minutes while she spoke to me. I have no idea what we talked about as I was so anxious about my baby's crying but not confident enough to tell her to 'sod off'. As soon as she (finally) left, leaving me with my crying baby I took my him out and cuddled him, while sobbing myself. Awful, awful, awful.

I later found out that it's quite common for babies to not want to nap. All I needed was for her to tell me that. Didn't she know?

Maybe in the general scheme of things this doesn't seem that bad but I still feel a lump in chest where my heart is if I ever think about it.

I have another story I wont bore you with where I fell through the net concerning mild pnd with another HV (probably brought on by the first HV I saw).

Yes, it is great the UK has HVs but some of them definitely need better training and if they are going to be able to do their job properly then they probably need to be better resourced.

I'll step off my soap-box now!

[Katie]

I have read all of your posts with great interest!
Firstly I am a mum of an 18 month old little boy and I can honestly say I had positive experiences with health visitors I have seen but now I'm on the other side of the fence!
Im a general trained nurse working with health visitors and i've just found out that I've been accepted to train as a health visitor, having a a little boy at the age he is and having lots of friends with babies I am acutely aware of the opinions of the public when it comes to health visitors- a lot of them negative even from my own friends!
Half of me is in pure excitement as I'll be getting to do a job I am passionate about and absolutlely love and have a thirst for! On the other hand I realise that having a baby is the most precious and memorable time in a parent's life and that figures such as health visitors are sometimes remembered for a lifetime- for good and bad reasons!! So half of me is filled with dread, because although I'll give it my all and more and go to work every day wanting the best for every child I see and want to support mothers and babies as if they were my own family- I am still only human at the end of the day- and the responsibility weighs heavily on my shoulders!
Not forgetting that Health visitors are at the mercy of governments and their own priorities, targets and proving statistics!
Hopefully I am up to the challenge!