So what is the point of Health Visitors?

[wonderstuff]

I've seen 3 so far, they all seem very nice, but really not very useful.

Today lovely lady came by, did PND questionnaire, weighed my baby. Talked about weaning - advised that some babies (especially boys) are ready for weaning at 4 months, to be aware of him taking interest in us eating couldn't give any advise about BLW as no reseach has been done and she doesn't want to get sued - fair enough, but seemed strange that on the weaning age she was willing to contradict research evidence. She also warned of 'missing weaning window at 6 months' I didn't ask what would happen - will I end up bfeeding forever, Little Britain style? Told me breastfeeding was tiring (there was me thinking it was the lack of sleep that was knackering but presumbably if I bottle fed I'd have much more energy?) She stayed for half an hour.

Really what is the point - could money be better spend on Midwifery or Social care?

"So I may appear not to know how many exact portions of avocado or buuternut squash for a 7mth old, one of the most irritating questions I got asked in clinic this week,but I am relentless in my job of protecting vulnerable child"

I suppose that a health visitor might be there to diagnose anxiety in a mum who worries excessively about weaning.

Unfortunatey, I offended a community nurse by refusing to have her visit me and talk about weaning. I was insistant that if a health professional was to discuss weaning with me that they needed the proper health visitor training.

The reason for this is that I have a history of anorexic tenancies. Weaning is a difficult part of parenting for me. Its also why the health visitor came out to me when my daughter had weight issues rather than me going to clinic.

My chidren are well looked after and I don't think I am thick as poo eitheer. If I am healthy then my children will be healthy. My health visitor keeps my family healthy by keeping me healthy,

Caz10- Im sorry that you were given bad advise which would have caused health problems for your child.
Sadly in my own family like I have said,we have had awful experiences with the NHS ranging from consultants,GPs and nurses.
There are poor practioners throughout but also some amazing ones.

I just wanted to put the other side to health visiting which I still feel committed to inspite of the changes and cuts to service which I know have upset many mums who have felt neglected.

I have obviously upset a few of you by my comments on avocado. To clarify, I was not "off" with anyone,even though I may have felt irritated. That was because it was in sharp contrast to the bereavement visit I had done in the morning. I answered her questions,as I always do in clinics,with patience and a smile. Also enquired how she was feeling.
I would love to be able to do all the things I did when I started health visiting,weaning talks,postnatal groups,all of it. But with numbers of HVs at an all time low caseload numbers have tripled and I cannot do it all. So now its concentrating on vulnerable families,new babies,mums with PND,families with disabled children,parents with learning problems.

jaffacake I hope noone is seriously offended by the avacado comment!! I am a teacher, and some of my pupils have real serious issues going on at home and in school - it can be exhausting dealing with them and then some parent can come in and tip you over the edge by demanding a half hour meeting to discuss what I am going to do about her precious child's lost pencil..you must feel like that.

Again, not directed at you or any of the other HVs on here, but I am just aghast at what appears to be a lack of up to date training - if my HV was not qualified to advise on breastfeeding well fine, but she should have the sense to admit that and then show me how to access good advice.

Some parents are as barmy as a bed bugs. At least when a teacher sees a parent there are usually other adults in the building. Every school has its looney parents. Some schools in deprived areas or special schoos have more than their fair share of looney parents.

Just think all these looney parents were once visited by a health visitor on her own. They are brave people!

Caz10- Yes she should have had up to date training. In my area all HVs have had extensive breastfeeding training and do dropin breastfeeding clinics at the childrens centres and help with the one at the local hospital. I dont know what happens nationally with updates for HVs. There seems to be such a wide range of practices across the country which affects public confidence in the service.

Thank you for the comparison with your teaching experiences. It is hard isnt it to go to one extreme to another situation ?

I think I am brave being on mumsnet !

Jaffacake - I understood exactly where you were coming from. And I guess it must be very frustrating when people think that you're only there to interfere and answer questions about avocado portions, when you're working in such difficult situations day in, day out.

Sorry to harp on, but Rusty that didn't really answer my question as to whether the HV records go with the medical records. Is it enough to register with a new GP to alert the HV service, or is separate notification required? If the latter, people need to know this!

Also, I'm not sure if I said this before, but my current HV has been really good. I'm a little unsure about her b/f knowledge/advice but she has certainly been very supportive of me, and her observations and comments about me being a natural with DD and DD being really happy were just what I needed to hear when b/f was getting me down. Since I developed PND she has been really good, coming regularly to see me to talk and listen. DH has depression too (what a pair!) and she has persisted with offers of support in the form of an early years worker, which we've now taken up. It was tough to accept we needed help, but I feel she's handled it in a sensitve and tactful way. My initial fears that she'd be calling in social services were completely unfounded - thank God! So I completely do see the point of HVs in circumstances such as ours. And of course, without the routine visits, no one would have realised how much I was struggling and encouraged me to seek help.

The thing that I struggled with in my encounters with HVs was their tenuous grasp of quite basic statistics. Most of them treated the 50th weight centile like it was a goal that everyone should try and attain as soon as possible. I even sketched out a normal distribution (bell curve) to try and explain to one why I thought it was perfectly fine that my DD was still on the 2nd centile (she'd been born on the 0.4th so to my mind she was doing great), and to her credit she was very interested but then spoiled it somewhat by saying that since the growth charts didn't look anything like a bell curve I'd probably got myself all mixed up

There was one lovely lady who ran our baby group though - she was great. She left to have her own baby and I remember her sobbing with happiness (and probably hormones) when we presented her with a bag of presents and cards on her last session. She was really into BLW, an ex-paediatric nurse so gave us all brilliant infant recus training, and exceptionally tactful. Last thing I'd heard, she'd left our clinic and was working part-time elsewhere. A big loss to the clinic.

When a family register with a new GP the new Hv is informed then it is her job to contact the previous Hv to request notes.

I think you are wasting your time with some though jaffa - one or two here seem to be thick enough to condemn an entire profession based upon their experiences with a few HVs. I assume that they would do this with all midwives, GPs or paediatricians if they only met one or two who seemed incompetant.
Tbh they want to come and try the job before moaning about the pay and "waste of money" that HVs are. I think they may hotfoot it for the hills after a few weeks under the pressure I have experienced in the last couple of weeks.
I have no issue with anyone moaning as I have read shocking advice here as given by some HVs but I do get irritated by the "well my HV/my friend's aunt's sisters HV was thick/outdated/cold so they must all be a waste of money" brigade.
Change the record why don't you and educate yourselves before condemning us - you may find we do not have the easy ride that you think we do. Tbh after the past week I am tempted by job hunting and "Xmas assistant in M+S" is looking tempting.

So - yes - not at my best at the moment but I will still have a smile and be professional at work next week, missing all the normal stuff as usual and spending half the week in the local social services building. I will explain yet again to the 15 year old why weaning is at 6 months and extol the fun of baby led weaning while knowing that her mother is going to wean the baby at 16 weeks. I will get the breastfeeding counsellor in to support other mothers and the nursery nurse and infant massage teacher in to support another family with colic. I actually LOVE my job and despite the pressure and the desire at times (like now) to find another job I probably wouldn't swap it for the world because when I make even a little bit of positive difference it's worth it. When I help a mother believe in herself through depression it's worth it. The job itself is worth doing and worth doing well - if the funding was there I could do much much more.

Oh don't get me started on centile charts frozennorth. Most HVs trained without doing any epidemiology - the training ver the past 10 years has included this so HV NOT understanding them is clearly incompetant. I always educate the mother about the charts so she will know if she's told rubbish.

I get very frustrated on here when I see mothers of perfectly healthy babies who have been told to "top up" because the baby has gone from the 75th line to the 25th over a space of 20 odd weeks. No - that's NOT abnormal in an otherwise healthy baby and if the baby was NOT healthy I think often his/her Mum would know.

Hi Ghostly,a fellow HV to help fly the flag for the service!
Sorry you too have had a bad week. Its probably not good for our heart rates to go onto MN but somehow strangely compulsive to argue for your profession.
Take care out there in some tricky homes.
Came across a large loose snake this week in someones living room. Frightened me nearly senseless!

I am surprised that health visitors post on mumsnet, you would think they would be sick to death of daft mums.

Ha! Ha! At least no health visitor will see me at a baby clinic asking stupid questions about advocardo. I'm was far to scared of crowds. Going to clinic gave me panic attacks. I got over it, but it made going shopping in Tescos a challenge at the time.

My health visitor tells me that in her experience there is a fine line between high levels of intelligence and madness. She is clearly an intelligent woman, prehaps she is mad as well.

G&t calling with X factor bye !

Thing is, in most professions, if an individual sees that the service they are working for really isn't functioning properly, they must either work hard from within to change it, or resign to protest and make their point - and in order not to be part of something really quite dangerous. It's particularly important that this form of whistle-blowing does happen in the area of child protection, as Victoria Climbie, Baby P and all the other tragic cases show.

It's just not right to carry on working in a situation where you're not functioning properly, either through exhaustion or lack of knowledge, or through lack of respect for clients, whether they be the very poor ones or the ones who can afford avocado and butternut squash.

Back from G&T. I am functioning properly,I have the knowledge,respect for all the clients I deal with and am very highly thought of by the GPs,paediatricians and social workers I work with.
This is not a dangerous situation,I have tried to emphasise that it is the vulnerable families which we are concentrating on. I know that my interventions this year alone have saved the lives of 2 neglected babies.

But this thread became very abusive about health visitors and I wanted to discuss some issues that we are facing.
However the response has been yet more abuse and attacks.

My dd is 17 tomorrow and the fact that she's even here has a lot to do with the wonderful HV I had at the time. She pretty much saved my dd's life. She was professional, caring and determined to do her best for both of us. I was perfectly capable of assessing my dd's health needs but couldn't get anyone but her to take notice of my worries.

I don't dispute that there are some rubbish ones out there, there are some rubbish GPs (got the T-shirt), poor teachers, dodgy coppers etc but don't tar all of the profession with the same brush.

Thank you for positive comment. Glad everything worked out well for your DD and you.

Really, health visitors, leave the thread. You will be marmelised by some until you are pounded to a pulp.

What would you say are the main issues HVs are facing?

This is not a place to make throwaway comments about avocado. Thes epopel will not let it lie.

David Cameron said before the election that he wanted to recruit 4000 more HVs because he recognised that parents need support within the home when they have babies and small children. He linked this to research showing the high rates of postnatal depression, child poverty and poor mental health statistics of children in UK compared to the rest of Europe.

What are HVs facing is shortage of trained HVs in sufficient numbers to deal with what we are being asked to cover by commissioners of the NHS.

all the ones i have ever seen and the ones my friends have told me about are shit when it comes to helping with breastfeeding - they seem to encourage women to give up. twats