My HV has just phoned to ask if DS1 was going to school this year.

[Bleatblurt]

I am a bit

Why does she even know that I didn't register DS1 (he's 4.5) for school? She also wanted to know if he was going to be going next year instead and sounded a bit herself when told no.

Is it normal for a HV to get involved? She even said she'd tried to come round to see us last week but we were out.

again.

It's because we took DS1 out of nursery I bet. Must be evil parents hiding abuse or sommat.

Please feel free to tell me I'm being a paranoid arse and it's normal for the HV to contact me.

I do think this is fairly normal stuff really.

I had a form to complete from my HV before dd started school so I could confirm which school (if any) she would be attending. Because it helps them keep complete records for things like eyesight/weight/hearing testing that can take place at school, and for vaccinations too.

I personally think that it is a good idea for there to be records kept of where children might be - in a non-judgemental, matter of fact way of course.

Ahh, ok. I shall stop being then.

I don't vaccinate either. I must be on her red alert list.

I'm a bit too.

It might be because they usually "hand over" to a school nurse, and she didn't know which school nurse to hand over to? So it's just been flagged up when she was doing her normal admin. The usual thing to say is "oh yes, we're HEing, so please just pass over Ds's records to the practice nurse at our surgery".

And of course the bright and breezy "ah yes, I know we've never actually met you, but we're delighted that you offer the HV service and if we have any concerns about our children's health we'll be in touch".

It's so important, I think, to remind these people that they are employed to offer a service which we avail ourselves of if it suits us.

I think also, and it's a bit 'out there', but they are trying to chase up the whole 'missing kids' thing where children are not in school, and generally not being seen. In view of...er...recent events.

Big brother is watching us! Which for nearly all of us will be a pita and faintly insulting, but for the vulnerable few, might be a way out of misery.

Iyswim?

Bet your name is up in lights with the vaccination thing

I bet the red telephone in her office started flashing and sirens went off

I agree that people should see HVs as people who we can use if we need help rather than people who are "watching us". I know opinions of Hvs vary a great deal but mine would be happy enough with the breezy response ommwardandupward advocates.

She's actually very nice and goes for the, "You know where I am if you need me, I can see you're all doing fine," line.

I did wonder if it was someone else/other piece of paperwork that had told her she had to chase me up for the info.

Which in turn made me wonder WHO wanted us checked up on.

I'm not paranoid. They ARE out to get me. [sticking out tongue]

I think it's a good thing HVs are keeping track of children, as some parents ARE hiding abuse.

Why on earth wouldn't you vaccinate though

back at you RedEmma. I'm so not getting into a debate about that. I've seen the carnage on MN threads about vaccinating.

And yes, yes I agree it's a good think HV's are keeping track of children. I just had my own little moment but I'm over it now.

Like Emma I think its good that HVs are following up on children who are falling out of the usual system. MNetters would be among the first to finger point at health and social services if there was abuse going on and no-one had ever questioned why the child was not "in the system".

You can't have it both ways.

Just breathe butterball.....

I have my first ever smear test (TMI) in an hour so am a bit wibbly for some stupid reason.

It's making me feel a bit out of sorts and wanting to bite.

it is totally normaly. you are completely overreacting. but given smear test fragility understandable.

Butterball, you don't need me to patronize you about the HV and at-risk children - but I thought I'd say I know how you feel about the smear. I had my first for years the other week and it came back today clear but I was really quite nervous before, during and after.

Thanks Kay, I am having a wibble on Chat about it too but all you lovely mnetters are helping me calm down lots.

Glad you got good news with yours!

so... at the risk of being provocative... are we saying that all parents are to be viewed as potentially guilty of child abuse until proven innocent by having their children inspected by state employees?

Would this have saved baby P/Victoria Climbie/the Eunice Spry children?

Is having a state-run universal child surveillance system effective? legal? ethical?

Wondering about the relationship between State and family which is implicit in the idea that all children need to be seen by state employees to safeguard them from their parents.

HVs are supposed to do pre-school health summaries of all children about to enter education, which they then hand over to the school health team.

Part of the pre-school summary is asking which is the intended school so they know which school nurse to hand over to.

If a child is being HEd then they either hand over to the GP, or in some areas the school health team will take responsibility for HE children that reside in their area even if not at school, because they are still school age (if that makes sense).

I don't think it has to be a state employee, but I do think every child has the right to have some kind of contact with an adult outside of their immediate family who could help them if they are being abused.

For most children there will be health or education officials involved somewhere, but it could easily be a nanny, nursery, childminder, Brownie leader, swimming instructor etc.

OP - I think that HVs expect to hand notes over to a school nurse so that's why they ask. Not inevitable though - we've never been asked.

It's probably just an admin thing - at school age we hand all records over to the school nurses and presumably you still have the right to access the school nursing service should you want or need to even if you are HE.

Am not a school nurse so I don't know. I just know that our Clerical staff book the records out at that stage. Personally I've never rung anyone to ask about schools and as our area don't do pre-school checks the GP's offer it here I don't often have contact unless a parent requests it.

Certainly it shouldn't be an issue just because you have chosen to HE.

Do you think that regularly seeing adults outside the family, be they state employees or not, is an effective way of child abuse being spotted or prevented, RedEmma?

Of [i] course [/i] most children see adults outside the family lots, whether they go to school or not. But not all. And if someone has a child whose SN mean, by definition, that they are going to be best off being quietly at home with their family a lot of the time, should those families be subjected to preventative surveillance (which would, on its own, be distressing to the child as well as contravening whichever thingy it is about the right to a private family life unless there's reason to believe that wrong doing is occuring)? And health officials aren't always involved, particularly among the HE families where there are SN of some kind or another - because by the time many start HEing, they have been so right royally screwed over by education and health professionals that they want nothing further to do with them. This isn't me being tetchy, I am just reporting the sense I get from contact with HE families where there are various SN.

I was once employed to find 'missing' children. (I wouldn't actually find them, I'd just flag up children where data on then was missing iyswim). It was just to check they were okay. The more data missing (i.e an a&e record, but no school, gp or hv record), the higher up the list they'd go for investigation.

It's probably very annoying for the majority of parents to be 'investigated', but the LA has a statutory responsibilty for all resident children and there are 'accountable' people who would lose their jobs (and poss be put in prison) if anything happened to any of the children in their 'care'.

Oh I see, so we should risk cocking up the fragile life balance of children with SN's just so some people don't lose their jobs?

I can kind of accept some arguments for keeping an eye on 'missing' children, but that one's just ridiculous!

Is this a new thing as dd1 (5yrs) has not seen a HV since her 8mth check up and the same as dd2 (20mths).

And i have just had DS (8wks) and the HV said at the end of their visit to do the red book 'we don't need to see you as you as he's your 3rd'.