Is it unreasonable to expect help from the health visitors?

[jollier12]

I was visited by my health visitor soon after Jack arrived and she banged on about BREAST FEEDING! I get it! I'm doing it! No we don't have any problems at the moment! Oh well then que HV to start a 2 hour pontification on breast feeding! Waste of time. She also strangely mentioned erectile dysfunction but by that point I had well and truly switched off. I don't even know how or why!

3 month's down the line and after he's had antibiotics we get the dreaded THRUSH, in his mouth, on me nips, hell on earth.

Seen the GP given Clortromizole 1% for me and Nystatin for him. No better after a week. Boy screaming and not feeding, nipples on fire, no sleep and GP's don't have any appointments available.

Soooooo in my desperation I contact the HV.

They'll phone me back, the HV phones me back with get this..... Look on the internet. WTF? After asking for help and being told to chuffing google it I was a bit peeved. Is that really all they can do?

Needless to say I had to slap myself out of the despair and lock horns with the GP's to get an emergency appointment.

Oh they did by the way phone me to fill in an audit on what the HV covered RE breast feeding. Box ticked then!

But if you do have any problems further down the line, you know after the audits done and your paperwork filed your on your own.

YABU. I know there are probably great HVs out there but of the 5 or 6 I've encountered they've all been useless. Don't bother with them, just go straight to the GP if you have a problem.

www.breastfeedingnetwork.org.uk/pdfs/dibm/FAQs_Thrush__and_Breastfeeding_Jan-2012.pdf

www.breastfeedingnetwork.org.uk/thrush-and-breastfeeding.html

HTH.

I have no idea what the HV's are actually supposed to do, so I can't comment on whether they are any good or not. I saw mine once when DD1 was born and once when DD2 was born. I also had a phone call after DD1 was seen at A&E, but apart from that I have no idea what 'services' they are meant to provide. Are they...supposed to 'visit' me....clue is in the name perhaps ????

I would say I get all my parenting advice either online, from books or from my own parents. Health/illness stuff from GP.

if you have problemswith breastfeeding you are best to contact leleche league,nhs care is hit and miss.

andyes,hv are shite,i find i either smile and nod and agree with them,or tell the truth and get lectured!

(on cosleeping,feeding on demand,blw,etc,they all seem like supernanny to me!)

I dont see a hv and havnt since my 2nd child,there is a box you can leave empty on your doctors form when you register them,it says child health surveillance or something,then you dont have to bother with them.

Betty - as far as I can tell, HVs are mainly there to spot when a child is in danger due to neglectful/abusive parenting. They are a first contact for a new parent and it gives the NHS a chance to monitor them for the first few months to pick up on any problems. Of course HVs have to be seen to have a purpose beyond that, so they're also supposedly there to give advice on feeding and sleeping but as far as I can tell whatever "training" they have in those areas is extremely patchy and the advice is generally just personal opinion rather than anything solid or backed by evidence. It's best not to ask their advice IME as they could come out with any old shit.

I had an amazing HV, she was fantastic. Then she moved to another job and I got the shittest one on the planet

Mine just read stuff aloud to me out of leaflets and tried to convince me to take the baby regularly to the clinic in the dodgy part of town. When I queried why I couldn't use the one in town near the nice coffee shops she looked shifty - I suppose they have attendance targets. In an age with the internet I don't see the point as for anything urgent you'd go to the GP wouldn't you? My DSis admitted she went weekly to have PFB weighed but admitted it been for lack of much else to do!

Ambersocks ah I wondered what that box meant!

Phiney - you're expected to take them to be weighed so that they can check up on you and the baby at regular intervals for the first while. Unless your baby has particular problems or was premature etc then weighing every couple of weeks isn't really necessary and anyway it's something you could do at home yourself, it's not exactly hard! But by asking you to bring them in to be weighed and asking you to strip the baby off they can check that you're ok and that the baby shows no signs of injury or malnutrition.

How can it work for child protection if you can opt out?!

There's no system in place to force people to have monitoring so it's better than nothing. They don't actually inform new mums that they can opt out - a lot of them believe it's compulsory and nothing is done to enlighten them on that. Plus not showing up raises red flags in itself so even if you do opt out you're still conspicuous and it can prompt a visit.

I asked my hv if she thought my dd1 was getting enough milk (at 5.months) and told her how many bottles and how many oz per bottle she was drinking.

The hv asked how much is that in pints?!

WTF!! Who measures baby milk in pints?!

Hmmm they can bog off then I'm afraid! I own a pair of scales. They really worried poor DSis by going on about how small her DD was. DSis and BIL are both about 5 foot. It wasn't surprising their child would be petite.

This is just my issue but I can't help contrasting the massive infrastructure there is for all these baby checks with the near total absence of any help for the infertile is bitter

I see, so you're damned if you do and damned if you don't? Ah well, they can come and visit then and I will make sure I've read all the latest research. We can have a nice debate.

I never opted out and have never had any contact. I don't see how it can offer any sort of child protection when they don't contact you / visit.

Don't even bother! IME HVs have a particular skill in not listening - debating is utterly pointless. To be fair they do have quite an important role. It would be easy for a new baby to be forgotten as they aren't really "in the system" in the sense that they're not at school and aren't expected to be anywhere where someone can check up on them so HVs fulfil that role, monitoring the most vulnerable. Most will be fine and need nothing but some will very much need the HV to step in and in some cases call social services. Better that than some poor baby just dies of neglect IMO.

YANBU to want them to be able and willing to help out after all the pro-breastfeeding stuff they give out when you're pregnant. IME, very few HV have the relevant know-how to deal with complex bf issues though, so you'd be much better asking them to put you in touch with either a Lactation Consultant, or at the very least a bf counsellor from La Leche League, the NCT, Breastfeeding Network or a Peer Supporter.

HV's are trained in most issues with the most up to date evidence based training- however not all of them advise the most up to date evidence based research! Its a minefield at times- im doing my health visitor training in September and am working as a childrens trained nurse with the health visiting team, I have already had issues with conflicting advice from some of the 'older' hvs advising some parents basically a load of crap.
Fear not, health visiting is changing- the government are taking on an extra 4500 hvs and they will be trained in up to date issues and be a bit more modern than many of the current practising health visitors.

Regarding the GP appointments being full, where I live if your baby is poorly you are seen that day. Automatically.
My HV usually tells me to see the GP, so I now tend to cut out the middle man.

Mine was a piece of work; delighted I bf but totally missed my descent into PMS (fair enough as I didn't see her much). When my second was born 6 weeks prem v jaundiced preceded to give me bf advice that was wrong (and directly contradicted SCBU), didn't refer me to the support group for mums of prem babies (which she said she would and hyou have to be referred to attend) and decided we 'didn't need to bother' with the PND checklist as I seemed fine (despite my previous PND being written all over my notes in letters of fire).

My HV recommended colief (tho she spelt it coleaf) for ds as he has colic/reflux/haven't got a clue!

All find and dandy til I read the box. 'An enzyme to break down lactose in milk to aid digestion'. DS is on lactose free milk which HV knew! Was more cross when I realised said advice would have cost me 12 quid had I followed it without reading the box.

Hmmm, I have already told the HV that she can forget any 9 month/1 year development check. I don't have the luxury of time purely for humouring them and I risk locking horns with some nonsense or other (I will probably not be feeding/sleeping/routining/vaccinating/nursery-rhyming in line with their opinion).

She calls me at random intervals and asks if I am okay. I say yes, but I'm very busy, thanks for calling, goodbye. Seems to do the trick so far.

My HV is wonderful! It's all well and good saying that you don't want them interfering but when there is something wrong with your child it is a god send. My HV arranged for my non verbal DS to be seen by the early intervention team as an urgent case and now will get a lot of support for his diagnosis. My DD is allergic to cow's milk protein and my HV went against the gp who gave me soy and got the paediatric dietician to back her up. She also got me an emergency consultant appointment when DD dropped two percentiles. She's amazing.

My last two HV were rubbish though - one was very patronising and the other saw me once in two years. I suppose it is a bit of a lottery like with finding a good doctor, dentist etc.

Op I had nipple thrush,,, painful as hell, it will get better with antibiotics and I used a nipple shield just as a temporary relief.

Never bothered with HV.

I am a district nurse and we worked along side them. Sorry to say not sure what they actually do even now tbh.

The health visitors in my area are brilliant and really supportive, they tell you to contact them with any problems and if you do they are really, really helpful. I've contacted them with minor worries over things like loose movements, teething, ear pulling and head banging just to see if I should go to the doctor or not. They've been really good, given me lots of helpful advice.

They also do have a big role making sure kids are not at risk, coming round and checking the house out and what is going on with feeding, weaning etc. I can't say enough good stuff about mine.