ANTE-NATAL CARE

Evening Post, Volume CXIII, Issue 32, 8 February 1932, Page 11

ANTE-NATAL CARE

WORLD-WIDE PROGRESS

After visiting clinics in Great Britain, Ireland, the Continent, and America, Professor B. Dawson, of Adelaide, who has been appointed to the Chair of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Otago University, arrived at Wellington today by the Monowai from San Francisco. He will go South on Wednesday evening.

In an interview with a "Post" reporter, Professor Dawsou said that his tour of clinics had extended over six months. Starting in London, ho .visited the larger provincial centres in England, then Edinburgh,- Glasgow, and Dublin, and went across to the Continent, visiting Stockholm, Lund, Copenhagen, Kiel, Hamburg, Berlin, Zurich, Berne, Geneva,. Paris, and Amsterdam. From there he proceeded to America and visited the clinics in Montreal, Toronto, New York, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Boston,- Rochester, Chicago, St. Louis, and finally San Francisco.

"Interest in the problems of obstetrics is increasing all over the world, particularly in America," said Professor Dawson, "and increasing emphasis is being laid upon the value of thorough ante-natal care of expectant mothers. I may say that the organisation of obstetrics is probably more thorough in the northern European countries, such as Scandinavia and Holland.

"The question of maternal mortality is receiving world-wide investigation as an( .extremely difficult one to assess from a statistical point of view, owing to the fact, among others, that some European countries-have not yet adopted the international standards of medical nomenclature drawn up by the League of Nations. The position is still further confused by the diverse methods of compiling statistics used in various countries, and therefore it is extremely difficult to arrive at an equitable comparison between the maternal death rates in various parts of the world. "There is no doubt that there arc two important factors concerned in an attack uDOn maternal mortality," Professor Dawson added, "the first being the_ more general careful supervision for expectant mothers, and the second the more comP'ote realisation by the public of the need for such care and the real necessity of appreciating the gravity of complicated obstetrics, which can bo as dangerous and hazardous as any maior surgical operation."