I'm a health visitor

[HurricaneLane]

So you can AMA?

But as we seem to get such a bad reputation I'm thinking of starting a blog or a social media account to try and show that we are helpful, want to help and really aren't offering what people alot of the time think of us?

Can I ask if you would find this helpful, and whether a blog or social account would be better?

@HurricaneLane thanks for your reply, it's really encouraging to hear things have improved.

When my DS was born a HV visited me at home. One of the things she did was ask me for names and dates of birth for all our extended family members (grandparents, aunts, uncles etc). I was in a haze and tired from childbirth, so I wasn't thinking straight, and just gave her all the info that she wrote down. What on earth could this have been for? I then wondered if I had broken data protection by giving out other people's data? It struck me as seriously odd.

My HV was the who got the ball rolling and then pushed for my son to be seen by the 0-5 SEN team and SALT.
GPs tend to be useless in this area. My HV was an absolute star. I know for a fact we wouldn’t of gotten my sons diagnosis so early without her.

Just want to say OP that I’ve only ever had positive experiences from our HVs and they’ve all been fantastic so thank you.

I've had mixed experiences with HVs and I got the impression that - not to put too fine a point on it - their level of intelligence varied quite widely, some were incredibly wise and supportive and some you might as well have been talking to the wall.

Do you get a very varied level of educational background and experience coming into the job?

Do you have any male health visitors on your team? I was allocated one when dc3 was small, and to be honest I didn’t feel comfortable with him.
Do you have to work to overcome conscious / unconscious bias (be that maternal age, socioeconomic background, race, religion)?
How much ongoing training do you get? Advice and best practice moves on all the time, so I just wonder how you keep up to date.

So I've only ever had great experiences from HVs. Honestly I couldn't bad mouth any of yous.

My question is, Is there like some kind of plan as to how many times yous visit from when the child is born?

I just feel like the visits were a bit excessive especially after coming back from the hospital. I just wanted to try and rest after being in labour for 3 days. I had my HV visiting everyday for a week and then every other day after that. I kept telling her I'm fine but she still kept on visiting.

I'm curious as to how you manage your work/with whom you choose to spend time. I barely saw a HV with DC 1, but I had contact as I was taking him to weighing clinics. By the time of his 27 month review it was covid, but we did do a zoom one.

With DC2, born during Covid, there has been nothing since shortly after the birth until her 27 month questionnaire arrived in the post.

It concerns me that there could be people who just fall off the radar entirely, or so you have any requirement or onus to keep an eye on 'everyone'?

*do you have

My health visitor has just messaged to ask if she can come to complete paperwork. How would you engage a mum? Do you see your role as a tick box exercise unless there is safeguarding issues or MH difficulties? How do you support mums with PND?

Hi op, my kids are older now but I found the health visitors perfectly nice. I didn't mind the questions because I could tell they were screening me for mental health issues or difficult home life. I was clearly considered competent because we didn't have any additional involvement beyond the set checks.

I love my HV!
She has seen me at my worst and pushed me through.
The current help we are getting for DC is all thanks to her.

With it being your job, like any other job, do you find somethings a chore?
What do you dislike doing the most?

So no, I don't see my role as a tick box exercise. Every family is soooo different. I do ask about family, but mainly dad because I ask for consent to put the family together in our notes for our multi team working it gets everyone on the same page, everyone needs to read it before we visit. Families don't want to repeat things to you, your there to support them.

I have mandatory contacts so I deliver them and I sort what families need as I meet them so for pnd I might visit alot and offer emotional support, signpost into the community, refer for counselling, speak with mum and the family re the GP. It really depends what the mum would like and what the family would like. Its not about what I have to deliver because I'm there to support the family.

We do all have different backgrounds but we should all be on the same page... its disappointing to hear we aren't tbh

Engage a mum, humour always and show that im human I'm just another human. Find common ground, chat, everyone likes open chat. Show your there to help fundamentally be honest.

My favourite bits- ooo I just enjoy supporting tbh, I love the whole journey with a family and watching them grow.

My least favorite, online training like health and safety but it has to be done ✔️ I'm not a fan of days which are packed with visits as I like time with the families but if its important I'll get a family in.

So we do try, if your straightforward we try to leave families alone and encourage them to ring us, we are always around. Sadly my caseload is primarily safeguarding now... I'd love to be able to offer more, our team is huge and some families prefer a hand off approach but honestly, we are always around

I don’t know why you get such a bad rap, my HV was lovely and supportive. If she told me I was doing something against guidelines I was very appreciative to be shown the safest way, none of this “don’t tell me how to raise my child” business.

I would question why you don’t talk about car seat safety. Surely if you advise on sleep safety this can also be talked about. Such as extended rear facing and not wearing coats in car seats, there are already plenty of leaflets than can be used.

Thankyou for doing a pretty thankless job.

How do you feel about people who decline the HV service?

What do you do if anything in this circumstance?

As pp asked how do you manage who you see and what do you view as a priority? For 3 years I called hv because I knew my sons development was seriously delayed and I never got a health visitor, at one point I actually cried down the phone because I had no idea how to help my son or what was going on.
Once I had figured out on my own what was going on and he had attended specialist pre school settings, multiple therapies and was about to start school with an ehcp in place only then did someone call me to ask if it was ok to sign him off as he was about to start school 😔.

I found the baby weigh clinic so stressful. My hv wanted my second child weighed every second day. My first son has additional needs and when he was having his operation they weighed him every 12 hours🙄. Mine were judgmental and put me off having any more kids.

Just wanted to share my experience. My HV was brilliant, so lovely. I was unfortunately quite unwell and hospitalised for 5 days or so when my DD was about ten days old. DD went home to be looked after by my husband, our HV called him every day to see how he was, could she help and asking how I was. She came round to see me the day after discharge. Unfortunately my DD then became unwell and we ended up straight back in hospital, she helped with getting us seen and made sure we were both fit and well. Really a lovely lady, no judgement or patronising behaviour as experienced by others.

I'm so sorry some of you have had awful experiences.

So in terms of priority etc we have a criteria but sometimes you just go on your clinical judgement, you know when a family need a bit more. Sometimes they tell me and that's fine too.

Declining, it's hard but tbh most of us totally understand. It's very busy having a baby and if your an experienced mother I totally get it or if you've had a bad experience with us. We just document and that's that tbh, we often ask why and it's not a judgement it's just if it's anything we can use to improve our service we will

Ahh car seats should be discussed! Maybe not at length but I me mention rear facing and sleeping in them

Another question if you don't mind.... what are you judged on in terms of your performance in the role? Do you get regular performance reviews and is there any kind of promotion pathway? Is there such a thing as a senior HV? Or is it graded like nursing?

If a family opt out of the service do you push it or just let them be, as it is optional?

We would offer again but on the whole, no is a no. No is a full sentence type thing for us.

So yes, we have band 5 nurses, I'm a hv so band 6, then we have clinical coordinator hvs up to a 7 but it also branches out so we have infant feeding teams, family nurse partnerships, complex disability health visitors all at various bands so yes there's progression but also vastness so you can do up moves or side step moves with your career or you can just be, stay where you are. We aren't judged on performance but have regular supervision, appasals etc