HELPING THE RACE

Evening Post, Volume CVIII, Issue 82, 3 October 1929, Page 10

HELPING THE RACE

MOTHERS AND BABIES

PLUNKET SOCIETY'S WORK

AN ENORMOUS INCREASE

Encouraging results of the working of the Boyal New Zealand Society for Health of "Women and Children were recorded in the annual. report presented at the General Conference of the Society held in Wellington, to-day.

The report stated that the number of visits of mothers and children to the Plunket Booms showed an enormous increase, for there were 83,261 more visits paid to the Plunket Booms than during the previous year.

In reference to these figures, it "was interesting to note that the visits to the Plunket Booms during the year 1928-29 included 52,032 visits of older children —a gratifying response to the sytematie endeavour which was "being made by the society through its nurses to keep in touch with the children throughout the pre-school period, .j A decrease of about 2 per cent, in the number of visits paid by the Plunket Nurses to homes was accounted for by the fact that mothers had been encouraged to bring their babies and older children to the Plunket Booms, in order to conserve the nurses' time as far as possible. It must be clearly understood that, besides the ' mothers and babies came into direct ebntaet with the Plunket Nurses, a large proportion of the society's iiervice to mother and child was carried out by members of the various branches, and also by mothers who, having received benefit themselves, were only too glad to' help their friends and neighbours. ALL MOTHERS PROVIDED TOR.

Further, there was a very large amount of correspondence and dist'ri : butipn of the society's literature carried on by the Plunket. nurses, by the committees, and members of the branches, "by the niatrons of the Karitane Hospitals, and tlirough the. medium of "Our Babies" newspaper column. Indeed, there must now be very few, if any, mothers in the Do--miniou who do mot receive direct or indirect benefit through one or other of these various agencies. The percentage of new cases which were nurtured in the natural way was 84.49. During the year 1925-26 the percentage was 81.72; in 1926-27 it was 83.54; in .1927-28 it was 84.47; and in the year 1928-29 it showed a slight *irther increase. . ' OPENING UP COUNTRY AREAS. . The district Plunket nursing staff was increased during the year by three nurses, who were appointed to the now residential centres established at Granny, Palmerston North, and Eanfurly. The districts opened up from these, three centres as headquarters covered widespread country areas. At 31st March, 1929, 117 Plunket nurses were employed for district work' alono (exclusive of relieving nurses), the report continued. The large increase in the number of eases dealt with, and the most intensive work which was boing done in the ante-natal and pre-school periods, pointed to a necessary and inevitable increase in the district Plunket nursing staff in the near future if efficiency was to be maintained. The provision of a car where circumstances warranted it arid finance permitted, had.in many districts lightened the nurse's work, economised her time, and enabled the society to give the best service to mother and child. To date 31 branches had provided cars for the Plunket nurse's use. PEE AND POST-NATAL SERVICE. The society's policy of extending the more intensive ante-natal service to the smaller centres as circumstances permit was being steadily pursued. During the past three months two of the secondary centres had established specially equipped ante-natal clinics at the Plunket rooms, with promising results, while other branches had plans in this direction; well in hand. During the past year the expectant mothers attending these, special aute-natal clinics numbered 1385, and a total of 7728 visits -wero paid to the climes. Apart from the work of the speciallycquipprd ante-natal clinics,- all district Plunket nurses in the course of their ordinary work gavo advice to expectant mothers on matters relating to prenatal care. The post-natal work continued to progress on the same lines as hitherto. From the record of the very largo number of baby cases on the Plunket nurses' books—numbers which were ever increasing—it was apparent that this section of the work still made the greatest demands on the Plunket nurses' time and energy. HEALTH AFTER BABYHOOD. In spite of the heavy demands of the ante-natal and post-natal work, there had been an increasing volume of work done in the pre-school age section. An awakening interest and a slowly .growing realisation of the importance of continued supervision for the safeguarding of health after babyhood was noted. During the past year Plunket nurses m all.parts of New Zealand made a careful record 'of the heights and weights of children from 18 months to 5 years of age, with a view to collecting figures from which data regarding the height and weight of New Zealand pre-school children might be deduced In order to enlarge the .field, the Free Kindergarten Associations in the four main centres were approached, and kindly gave permission for the Plunket nurses to weigh and measure the children attending all kindergartens in the cities and suburbs. As a controlling tactor m making deductions from these figures, an examination would be made later of selected children of good physique and normal nutrition. The actual figures would be published later. DISTRICT PLUNKET NURSES. There was now a total of 117 district Plunket nurses on the permanent staff throughout New Zealand, approximately half this number being employed in the cities and towns, and naif in country townships and rural areas. In addition an average of about ten relieving nurse's" were required for holiday relieving Arrangements had been made for I lunket nurses to continue to take special "refresher" courses in ante-natal nursing, at one or other of the city Plunket clinics. During the past few months "New Plymouth and Wanganui had undertaken more intensive antenatal work, having equipped and commenced working special ante-natal clinics with promising results. With the ever-widening circle of its activities, the attention of the society during the past year had necessarily been turned particularly to the matter of acquiring suitable habitation for its work, and an active desire on the part of committees throughout the Dominion to acquire, convenient and up-to-date Plunket rooms had been manifest increasingly, not only in the larger centres, but in the smaller branches and sub-branches as well.

The Defence Committee of the House of Representatives yesterday afternoon reported upon the petition of Marion Thomson, of Wellington, asking for a compassionate allowance in respect of her late husband's services as instructor in the Defence Forces. The committee recommended that the petition should be referred to the Government for eoniSidraatioji. ~ ' ■""-.'.. --■