Werid questions from health vistor

[Sunbeam1112]

It seems to change all the time currently pregnant with DC 3 and had my health vistor pre baby visit. With DC2 i had my intial visit at the beginging of my pregnancy normal standard questions.

my DD had her 2year check couple mobths everything ok HV wad impressed how advanced DD was. So when i had my visit on monday i was taken back by the questions asked.

H/V Questions asked
Mine & DH childhood how would we describe it?
If we had siblings?where they treated better?
Who was i closest to growing up?
How did our parents discipline us?
How do i discipline my children?
Asked about our fiances if we could afford the house? Explained my DH was on a very good wage.

Asked about domestic abuse twice?
Past relationship with DS dad
Asked twice if i self harmed?

Aibu to seem to think it was OTT. Given we live in a nice area, clean tidy house, Already got 2 DC no problems. She read from two questionnaires. Spoke to my SIL who is a social worker and said shes probs be on safe guarding course or they might of been a child death in the area. H/V is doing additional two visits after baby. She said at the end shes happy nothing to worry about. Just odd to do so many for a third baby.

Also, tidy house means fuck all - I always tidy up if someone is coming round, downstairs at least! I get more done in the 2 hours before someone visits than I do all week

Even if it's not true, it sometimes feel as though you can't win. I'd never refuse HV involvement because a HV at work told me once to encourage all parents to agree to the service, because if they don't it 'raises informal red flag's...whatever that means!

There have been concerns about nosy parker HVs alerting social services because they feel you've got something to hide. I think in practise everyone just breathes a sigh of relief as it's one less case to worry about.

I read a lot about HVs in advance of my visit, and found some real horror stories, so was on high alert for any rude / irrelevant / bossy questions and behaviour, but she was good as good. If she starts overstepping her bounds I will refuse service. They can send SS if they want, I've got nothing to hide.

Money = they want to know if you'll struggle financially with a new addition to the house, mum on mat leave, etc. Nothing sinister.

Things have certainly changed. Surely you'd only answer such intrusive questions honestly once the health visitor had built up some sort of rapport with you and that's unlikely on a first visit? I'd really like to know why they asked BloodyBloods for her husband's actual salary since you can find problems in the wealthiest families. Do they give you any leaflets or paperwork explaining the thinking behind the questions?

I must admit i did run with the dust pan and brush and straighten things up with a toddlers in tow she is a buggar for leaving a mess behind her.

Ha! at the housework - my HV told me (AFTER the home visit) that actually the housework Qs are to check you're not doing too much! Apparently obsessive cleanliness/phobia of germs is quite common in mothers of newborns and also associated with a higher incidence of depression, feeling a failure, not matching up to perfectionist standards etc.

Obvs they also follow up on signs of neglect, but those are usually pretty evident - it's the worryingly clean house that concerns them, apparently.

Ours was immaculate when the HV arrived. Our cleaner had just done 4hrs! The HV told me that she was very relieved to see the DC make a mess everywhere (including chalk drawings on the floor )...

Re finances, the HV did say she had to ask a few questions but she whizzed through them half-supplying the answers herself. I guess it was pretty clear from the family photos everywhere, DC1 chattering on about her cousins, and the fact that both DM and MIL phoned for a chat within 5 mins of the HV arriving that we're lucky with our families.

So yeah, all normal Qs and nothing personal!

MetallicBeige if they are doing that I would prefer it if they said that's what they are doing, "We are doing some research that will help in the future, we might have to ask a few questions about bla bla bla is that ok with you?" That kind of thing. It might stop all confusion and worrying which it appears this does cause!

They were from a questionnaire? Perhaps she had a target and you seemed open to such a line of questioning.
I met a hv recently i admit (around 8 years ago my youngest was small) i probably seemed a closed book. My previous hv i'd taken to, I don't recall her ever asking much as I had all the questions. This one was like an interrogation and I hadn't slept. Still. She was undaunted and was friendly. She may yet get me filling in those blanks!

Sounds like she's now required to ask these questions,and lacks the people skills to make you comfortable/ explain why she's asking them .

I wouldn't worry about your brother's past issues- I'm sure the family with no past issues is pretty rare.

Btw, I did get the impression that they were much more concerned about mothers' mental health than physical neglect of children, in terms of what they were looking for - that all the Qs were to try to spot mothers at risk of PND who might not be willing to ask for help.

Don't think they are weird questions at all - probably the kinds of questions that have needed to be asked for many years, and are now in place. If they seem weird, feel lucky that they have no relevance to you.

It does sound a bit instrusive but I can remember questions about DV/family life with DC4 (almost 5).

But it could be part of the change in HV role, I'm sure I read that local council's now have a health role (or will) and HV's will be part of that, so I suppose they will be more involved with children's centres and social services.

Emotional damage is now seen as bad as physical abuse, thankfully and there's as much of that about in 'nice' areas, as anywhere.

EA is being added as a crime, in DV cases and starting to get recognised by the courts etc.

The questions are very relevant to EA, however its a shame that HVs don't and are not welcomed to build up enough of a relationship to not barge in with them, so soon.

It probably is a new directive and she hasn't 'softened' her approach to it.

I don't know what the answer is, in terms of directing help to people, or safeguarding the under 2's, tbh, without offending someone.

Those questions seem odd to you because you they are not relevant to you.

If they were then your answers would of given the HV some indications of where support and guidance would be needed.

That explanation rather pathologises people who had miserable childhoods, though, doesn't it?

Answer that you have financial concerns, then you can imagine a referral to CAB or similar; Answer that you were treated poorly as a child and.... what exactly?

You can ask straight out what the agenda is, or contact her now and say you're a bit uncomfortable/unsure of what that was about, its a very reasonable question! And a hint to her that sharing it up front would have been good.

In the years I've been on MN I've learned to get less shy about asking women what can sound like intrusive questions in my working role (not in this field at all, just in one supporting primarily women) just because I've seen so many threads from women who are dealing with awful situations but don't feel anyone will listen to them or care if they try to talk about it, or they're they're overreacting or that it isn't bad enough to deserve help. Occasionally I'll get a look of surprise and a woman saying no one's ever asked her about that, she thought it wasn't something that could be talked about and she just had to get on with it. I do though make very clear from the start that the purpose is not to be intrusive, and 'pass' or 'mind your own business' is a perfectly acceptable reply! It's about offering the opportunity to talk about it if it's wanted, and I want the women I work with to have the right to be asked. It's not a demand for information or pressure to disclose.

On the other hand I've also worked with Local Authority teams under pressure to generate statistics about the population which was about proving service outcomes as part of the LA agenda, and that was intrusive, it was data collection and it was about benefiting the LA, not the person being talked to. The workers on those teams were under quite a lot of pressure to get that information collated from everyone on their register with all the questions being answered; where someone said 'pass' a worker was encouraged to raise it with them again to fill the gap in data. The workers did not like doing it and it was quite uncomfortable to see.

I think it's nice to have the opportunity to talk - I would have found it mainly an interesting chat. But the tone of the questions does seem rather overly negative given so little grounds for that. So I think I would have found that less encouraging than a more balanced set of questions.

How interesting. I am in early pregnancy and had no idea all this lay ahead. I think I'll be declining politely to go into a psychological analysis of my parents' relative relationship with me and my brother (not that there is anything much to say about it) and I think that the salary questions will be answered with "sufficient, thanks".

I do know that HCPs have boxes to tick and that's fair enough. My midwife asked me if I had a family history of female genital mutilation. I am white Scottish!

My HV made that very clear to me when she arrived. It's not with a view to snatching your children away or making her watch you more or anything like that

Granted it's nothing at all to do with snatching kids away (ive never been a fan of the state sanctioned kidnappers nonsense)
But it is partially to identify who needs watching more and quite rightly.

The social questions are questions designed to work out what band of support to put you in, some areas use universal,universal plus and universal partnership plus other areas call them different things.

Universal is everyone, universal plus is those who need more contact for what ever reason and universal partnership plus is those with significant support need who need lots if input from various agencies. Obviously a side effect of all this support is that you get watched more.

I'm actually encouraged by this.

I had horrendous PND (later diagnosed as PTSD from horrible labour) with DD and the questions I was asked missed the point completely. It was quite clear that the HV had a questionnaire to fill in, but everything was a very leading question. "you wouldn't dream of harming your little angel, would you?" - well, of course not, but... "Oh good! of course not, babies are wonderful.. and I'm sure hubby's over the moon?" yes, of course, but I have had waking nightmares which... "and I can see you've managed to get a wash this morning, changed your clothes - that's great, so no problems at all!" It's just that the nightmares are really quite bad and I don't know how to get help... "Back to breastfeeding, then, because that really is important!"

It's impossible of course to fill in all the possibilities from a single questionnaire in a 15 minute visit, but it does seem to cover a lot of bases as long as everyone's comfortable with entering 'not applicable' if it really doesn't.

Are you in Scotland? There are new protocols because of GIRFEC, SHAANARI and the Named Person scheme. 11 HV appts from third trimester until 5 years when the child is passed to School Nurse and school based Named Person.

It's one thing to ask if a person has any financial concerns and quite another to ask what someone's partner's or spouse's salary is.

WTAF?

And wow, I hope my children are not in the UK when they have kids - their sister died of cancer when they were little. What an intrusive and probing things to ask. I'd feel quite affronted at being asked such personal questions like that.

I was recently asked whether I was involved in crime or if I had guns etc. in the house. "Why yes," I answered, "I'm a criminal under-lord with an arsenal of weapons in the basement." either that or I just said err no

Meh you don't have to answer any questions like this.

You don't have to let the HV visit either. With dc4 I was too busy to be waiting in for her. Told them if I needed them I knew where they were.

It's a service for parents to access not a state right to interfere if not needed.

as for not seeing a HV as. 'red flag' that's crap.

It's part of the antenatal contact and is known as promotional interviewing. There are loads of questions in the official document but I find they can be very scripted and like people say can sound very nosy and intrusive especially if you are new to doing them.
Judgement needs to be used and I find most points can be covered just by simple conversation and semi structured questions and you will find so much more out and gain a better rapport than saying 'so did you have a nice childhood. Any financial difficulties? Any mental health problems'
The contact is designed to build a rapport before baby is born and to ascertain any support that may be needed