What do health visitors do during the day?

[lunavix]

I'm assuming they do more work than just seeing mums and babies right?

Just wondering, as locally the 'system' at our surgery has apparently changed. The health visitor comes to see you when the midwife discharges you, for the hearing test, and then if you want anything else again, you have to go to the 'weighing clinic' which is an hour on a monday.

I remember (in a different county) when I had ds, I had about 5 HV visits after the birth (granted it was a first child) culminating in her asking me questions relating to PND. This time, the HV said she will 'post' me a questionnaire. If it flags up any problems she'll post another at 8 months! Not see me, post another questionnaire!

I asked about ds's 18 - 24 month check (they havne't seen him since we moved here when he was 5 months old, I had to book his mmr myself at 19 motnsh as they don't bother) and she said, yes, another questionnaire in the post.

I asked a brief question about ds's weight, and she said she couldn't talk about two children at once, I had to make a trip to the weighing clinic to discuss him.

She incidentally also didn't do the hearing test as there's 'no equipment free'. And had to guess dd's weight in lbs as she didn't have a converter.

I really do despair. Or is this standard now?

maybe they work at different surgeries on different days of the week?

They can't win can they? I'm sure I saw another thread today about how overly intrusive HVs are, and how you have to see them too often.

Our HVs are great.

They have to go to all of their "How to be as mad as a box of frogs" and "How to make mums feel like rubbish" classes too remember .

lol, lol

Geddit?

Sorry!

for the first 12 months of dd2's life we saw a paed to monitor her weight gain - hv said was v v poor, so off we trotted to hospital every couple of months..........she turned 1 and I stopped breastfeeding and started cows milk - she started gaining more weight than she had done...........and hv suggested that she now be monitored for excessive weight gain ( she had 'shot up' to 10th centile from 5th)
i shake my head

The HVs at our surgery do house visits to mums with PND or other problems, once they are known to them - you can always request a visit if you think you have a problem. They are responsible for the elderly as well as children, and usually those are home visits. They do a lot of work with Primary school children, so may be doing sight tests, hearing tests, general health checks at several Primary schools. They do all the initial hearing tests when patients see the GP with hearing problems, before they are referred onwards. They run baby clinics twice a week, and every other Saturday. They also have a lot more paperwork than they used to have.

I'm not a fan of HVs, but they're certainly not underworked - at least the ones at our surgery aren't.

I don't know. Ours seem to have shed quite a lot of responsiblities. I didn't have to take DS#2 for his 18 month check up - just filled in a form. So if I was a hopeless parent who fed him junk all day and let him play with matches they'd never know....... And the baby clinic at the surgery was moved to a family centre on an estate that was miles away from many of the patients registered at the surgery so no good if you didn't have a car. Then it was moved again to a local church hall - once a month!!! It didn't really bother me as I did my own thing as he wa smy 3rd but I think it might have been disconcerting if it was your first.

I'm sure they have plenty to do though...just don't know what of for whom.