Human rights health visitor

[Erlisk]

I have seen it here before but the posts are old. Before my baby was born i told my midwife (UK) that i did not want any visits at home. I just like my privacy and want to be able to decide who enters my home. They offer visits as a service so i just decided to not let them in. I was happy to go for appointments.

Then in the hospital when the baby was born, they told me "someone was going to come into my house even if i do not want that". I kept saying no. They kept saying they just wanted to see where the baby would sleep etc. i said no. Then the midwifes came to the door and i told them i did not want them in my house. So they reported me to social services. Social services called me and threatened with official investigation if i do not let the midwifes and later health visitor in my house. Also for the one year visit.

I texted them many times i did not want. I also told them in person. So i have a lot of proof. Ok long story short i let them in.because they threatened with social services investigation = trying to take your baby. I had to let them in, they said everything was fine, and closed the case. But instead of bonding with my baby i was stressed that they were trying to take her away.

So. It is ten months ago so the one year visit is coming and I DO NOT WANT THEM IN MY HOUSE. So i decided to go after them. And yes, it is human rights violation. It is not normal in civilised countries that someone comes to your house without your consent and without a warrant. If you do not let them in they basically threaten to take your baby.

I am not looking for the comments that they are just helping etc. I am not interested in that 😉. What i am looking for here is other moms who went after them. I am researching where to complain. I am also making a list of solicitors who would help me. And maybe some group court case? I will make complaint to NHS. I believe we only have one year for this kind of thing so only people who experienced this last year. Or if you went through going to court and have a good no win no fee lawyer (London or Kent). They are violating human rights you everyone so no, i will not let it go.

Your children are not under SS because you weighted them. There is clearly a massive backstory to this.

I think it's worth pointing out @needmorelego that a GP is a qualified doctor, often with some specialist quals in women's and children's health. A health visitor is a nurse who has completed a one year course in health visiting.

My HV was unable to answer a single question or provide any helpful advice whatsoever. When I was in agony recovering from infective mastitis and struggling with breastfeeding, that she strongly advocated, she told me to wrap myself in a blanket and sit by the fire and if I needed any more advice to ring the NCT. Notwithstanding the fact that she had recorded information incorrectly and was unable to explain the scope of her role to me.

I concluded very quickly that if I had any concerns in relation to the wellbeing of my children, I needed to visit a qualified doctor. My babies did not need regular weighing, my eyes told me they were growing and filling their babyros.

The HV Service needs to be rethought when resources are scarce and higher quality services need to be better targeted to those who need them. Back then, mid 90s, there were 20,000 he's on about £20k each oer annum. That was not and is not, factoring in inflation, an effective use of resources when wards are short of nursing staff.

Depends what the medical issue is obviously.
Most of my (and my husbands) appointments that take place at our GP surgery are appointments with a nurse. We don't need to see the GP.
My daughter has some medical issues that we have needed to be seen by a GP but the GP doesn't do the treatment - they do the referrals for other doctors.
HVs are nurses and they can also refer to the relevant healthcare professionals in certain cases.

@RosesAndHellebores one extra year of training to become a Health Visitor - but that that follows the several years of a nursing degree to become a nurse in the first place.

To be honest the pros and cons of HVs is never going to be something Mumsnet agrees on.
The thread started because someone thought it was an invasion of privacy because a HV would have to enter her house 😱 Shock Horror.
She sounded ridiculously paranoid in my humble opinion.

@needmorelego three years with less practical training nowadays.

When my DC needed clinical input, it was usually something I couldn't manage at home: ear infections (anti-biotics), the HV could not have referred to the paediatric ENT consultant, DS's chronic asthma following a hospital admission for bronchiolitis - HV's couldn't have prescribed steroids in acute phases or referred to the required heart/lung specialist consultant.

Funnily enough the community paediatric nursing team were unable to provide the correct advice in relation to administering steroids and ventolin through a spacer. It took a specialist nurse to do that, for whom we paid. It wasn't a lack of understanding on our part either, simply poor communication and the right advice made the world of difference.

@RosesAndHellebores well yes - different medical issues need different specialists. Doctors, nurses, therapists...all good in my view.
But just for a couple of baby weigh-ins the paranoia and hatred of having a HV visit your home (for what will probably be less than 20 minutes) is just over the top.
This is an old thread....so I will leave it now.
🙂

@needmorelego, with respect, you were the person who stated that HVs were specialists and GPs were not.

I hope we can agree that the point is that when resources are scarce, they have to be targeted, that the HV service is not mandatory and families shoukd be told this for the sake of transparency, and actually, my time is valuable and if I am to give an individual 20 minutes of air time, it is a reasonable expectation that they are experienced and operate in accordance with established and evidenced competencies. Finally, baby weighing clinics are optional and nobody needs to attend them and HVs need to make that clear. As far as I am aware the opacity has got worse rather than better over the last 30 years.

30 years ago the Head of the HV was quoted in The Times as saying the role of the HV was to teach ignorant mothers the three c's. Cooking, cleaning and communication. That sealed their fate as far as I was concerned.

Why did they force your birth? Did they insist on inducing you for some medical reason and you objected?

What were the antibiotics for? Are you more qualified than your consultant to say whether your premmie twins needed them or not?

Why are your children under the care of a social worker? What's the actual reason? Is it all of your children they have concerns for or just your twins? Is the SW involvement just something relating to your twins birth and you resisting or questioning certain treatments and interventions or is there more to it?

It's very common for one twin to be born bigger and stronger than another so I don't understand what their issue with that is.

@RosesAndHellebores GPs aren't specialists.
They are General Practitioners.
They refer to a specialist if needed.
Some GPs do sometimes have an interest and more knowledge in certain medical areas. At my surgery there's one who is basically the best one for anything female related - but she is still a GP and will see anyone who makes an appointment about anything.
(There's also the useless GP who seems rubbish for any issues - all GP surgeries seem to have one of those 😕)
I understand Health Visitors are optional.
I just don't understand the sheer hatred and paranoia many on Mumsnet seems to have towards them.

@needmoresleep but HV's are no more specialist than GPs and their qualifications have neither the breadth nor depth of a GPs. I would trust the advice of a GP in relation to, for example, immunisation schedules, more than I would a health visitor because the GP is far more likely to understand the research and apply it to the needs of an individual child based on the child's clinical needs. Certainly more so in relation to intractable ear infections.

Perhaps the thing you are overlooking is that you had a good standard of support. Many of us have had a very poor and unreliable standard of support accompanied with inappropriate and incorrect comments.

It is about making clear a family's right to decline the service and if that right is not being made crystal clear then the service needs to be absolutely tip top in every single case.

I think we need to beg to differ but the bottom line for me is that the service is funded with public money. It therefore needs to be far more accountable for the standard of service provided. It's the waste!

@Needmorelego

Thanks !
Sorry if @RosesAndHellebores woke you up 😴

Yes this. Why are you so against a short visit in your home? I’m sure you can see objectively why continued prevention of this leads them to think the worst.

@HamieandHave unfortunately there isn't. The social worker visited this week but hasnt written a plan and told me to email the local authority with a complaint and to change health visitor so I have done. I've also got a lawyer representing the case. I can copy and paste parts of the report minus names. Just my refusal of her services has offended her. That's literally it.

@stupidboy they never told me they were inducing me they just did it. No medical reason other than I give birth quickly had my 3rd child at home within 6 mins and they didn't want my twins being born at home. Which legal I am allowed to do.

Yes I am more qualified the antibiotics were not needed. Breastmilk was needed. They had a blood test to show no antibiotics were needed. They wanted to start antibiotics before a blood test even though there were no signs of infection - because there wasn't one. A newborn baby needs breastmilk not antibiotics. Breastmilk is medicine, nutrition and the only thing a newborn baby will ever need.

They first were involved as I safeguarded the hospital due to negligence care but because the hospital are "higher" than me and lied... they put my children onto a plan... However there is no plan as nothing is needed and a social worker visits every 10-14 days just for a casual chat. She has written in black and white that no plan is needed and we do not meet the threshold However the health visitor states because I don't use her service it is huge concern. She lies alot and they do know. However as she is a professional they have to follow certain protocols.

There is no treatment and never has been... my twins were fortunately healthy they didn't require anything at birth until the hospital neglected them. This was their feeding. They didn't allow me to feed them and their blood sugar levels dropped (obviously) so they put them on a tube feed as a "top up" but still didn't allow me to feed them. So they were underfed for 2 days. When that happened I safeguarded against the hospital who then obviously blamed me. I had to express my milk so they could write how much Breastmilk they had I still wasn't allowed to breastfeed until I left hospital. Now they are 4 months old one baby is now 75th centile the other 50th centile and they function like your normal baby would... breastfed. Still no treatment.

Me neither. Neither does the social worker. As I say they were born 1lb difference anyways.

Honestly couldn't make this up. I have a lawyer involved as they need the qualifications but I'm actually studying law myself. And it's crazy how much of this is being broken.

This week no protection plan has been written and apart from the social worker noone contacts or visits... but a young child out there genuinely needs the help and that's sad!

Mate straight to hospital!!!

Breastmilk was needed. They had a blood test to show no antibiotics were needed. They wanted to start antibiotics before a blood test even though there were no signs of infection - because there wasn't one. A newborn baby needs breastmilk not antibiotics. Breastmilk is medicine, nutrition and the only thing a newborn baby will ever need.

DC2 was born quickly, just over 24 hours after my waters broke. I had IV antibiotics to make sure she was covered in case of any potential infection but she arrived so quickly they didn’t have time to give her the three doses they wanted to. So she had further prophylactic antibiotics in one dose on her first day. She was also EBF. They weren't recommending she had antibiotics for fun, there was a perfectly rational explanation that I was happy to follow. She also needed breastmilk because she needed nutrition. It didn't cancel the recommendation for antibiotics

Your answer poses so many more questions and so much of what you say just doesn't add up, but I honestly can't be bothered to give you the Spanish Inquisition over it. I know the NHS is far from perfect and doesn't get everything right, particularly in maternity care, but my gut feeling here is that they see you as some sort of obstructive crank who thinks she knows better than them, the highly qualified professional obstetrics doctors and nurses, on what is the best course of action for premature twins.

Your babies were six weeks early and at least one of them was worryingly small. If they were given antibiotics I am sure there was a very solid reason for it. And if you were not allowed to feed them yourself I am sure there was a very good reason for that too, given that the NHS is obsessed with trying to get every mother to BF. At 32 weeks there is a good chance they were not mature enough to latch on and feed by themselves anyway, which would explain why you were asked to express milk.

Yes I am more qualified the antibiotics were not needed.....A newborn baby needs breastmilk not antibiotics. Breastmilk is medicine, nutrition and the only thing a newborn baby will ever need.

Do you have any idea how many premature babies have died over the years, and still die in developing countries without access to decent medical care, precisely because they had absolutely nothing but breastmilk as their medicine and their nutrition? You sound like that Covid conspiracist woman who convinced her daughter with cancer that she didn't need chemo and she could heal herself naturally. The daughter died.

Unfortunately you're incorrect and if you didn't want to debate over it literally just don't.

The NHS fails. My babies were healthy because of ME. Fortunately you weren't there so I'm just going to ignore anything else you have to say as I'm literally a qualified health professional and I've raised 5 children now, whom have NEVER received any hospital care so I don't care for your opinion. My MW agrees with me, a DR did actually apologise and says Mum knows best breastfeeding is medicine.

This has nothing to do with Covid. But I'm glad you can be presumpticious and attempted to sound clever even with a name like stupidboy, which is what you're reflecting if I'm honest.

Honestly don't really care. My story is my story and your opinions Fortunately don't matter...

BTW everyone dies.

Sorry my maths was out there, they were six weeks early that's the main thing. And yet you say they would not allow you to breast feed them. I am just not buying that. The NHS push very hard to get all new mums BFing. Why not you?

I'm literally a qualified health professional and I've raised 5 children

LOL you are a personal trainer 😂😂😂

That hardly qualifies you to decide you know better than consultant obstetricians over whether your premature babies needed antibiotics or not. Honestly, you are hilarious.

Shirley knot?

If being a personal trainer = qualified health professional, then the fact I go to Christmas mass must make me Jesus.

Not only a PT but a PT who is studying law no less.

Those NHS consultants must be quaking in their boots.