Health visiting
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Health visiting services
Health Visitors offer services to families within our children’s centres and local health centres to provide services to families in locations close to their home. After attending antenatal classes and being seen at home by midwives, parents will receive information and support for their new babies, and also be invited to baby clinics to regularly weigh babies and ensure that they are healthy and well.
It is not uncommon for mothers to suffer emotional difficulties or low mood after childbirth. Health Visitors can follow-up with you discreetly at home and can refer onto other relevant services if need be. Your Doctor/GP can also refer onto services.
There are a number of infant feeding sessions offering breastfeeding advice and support. These sessions also offer facilities to weigh baby and health advice for mother and baby. Health visitors and midwives are available at these sessions. One to one breastfeeding support is also available on request, at home or at the postnatal group.
If you are a mother who has enjoyed breastfeeding, please look into the ‘La Leche breastfeeding peer counselling training programme’. This training programme offers mothers who have experience breastfeeding three months training to use their valuable experience to help support new mothers.
Service provided by health visitors include extra support at home for children and families identified as having greater health and social needs and health and development reviews. You can find out more in the sections below:
You can reach the health visiting team by phone: 020 8200 2500, press option 2; or by email: [email protected]
Extra support at home for children and families identified as having greater health and social needs.
Classes are held regularly on various topics such as baby massage and starting solids , and parents are encouraged to call and book onto a class in advance, as they are very popular.
An invitation is sent to parents of both one year old and two year old children to attend a routine Health and Development Review.
This involves health visitors reviewing your child's developmental progress with you and ensuring that they are meeting their expected developmental milestones. Children may then be referred onto other services if required such as opthalmology or speech therapy, and child health development team.
Health and Development Reviews
Health Visitors offer services to families within our children’s centres, family hubs and local health centres to provide services to families in locations close to their home. After attending antenatal classes and being seen at home by midwives, there will be a new birth visit by the health visitor and parents will receive information and support for their new babies. Parents will also be invited to Child Health Clinics to regularly weigh babies and ensure that they are healthy and well.
We strongly encourage you to attend these to ensure the best start to your young child’s life.
A Health and Development Review is an opportunity to:
- assess the health and development of the child within the context of his or her home environment and family circumstances
- ensure that families are linked in with the right services and support
- identify and address issues the parent or carer may have regarding the child’s health
As part of the review, an experienced member of the Health Visiting Service works with parents to complete an Ages and Stages Questionnaire (ASQ) about their child’s development. The questionnaire is a holistic and comprehensive assessment of your child’s developmental achievements across five key domains:
- Gross Motor (i.e. larger movements of arms, legs, feet etc.)
- Fine Motor (i.e. smaller movements needed to use pencils, scissors, play with blocks etc.)
- Personal/Social
- Communication
- Problem Solving
Two to two and a half years of age is a crucial stage when problems such as speech and language delay, tooth decay or behavioural issues can be identified. Support from the Health Visiting Service working collaboratively with you can provide help early and support you before problems develop.
Good quality, evidence-based early identification through developmental reviews, and Health Visitor facilitation of early intervention/support is key for improving outcomes and nursery readiness.
You should have received an appointment for a two-year review by post. If you are unsure, and want health visiting advice, please feel free to contact us via phone on 0208 200 2500 option 2 or email [email protected]
Telephone support is still on offer and contact details for your local team can be found here. The Health Visiting service is offering a 5 day a week duty line for parents to call for support and advice. You can contact the duty line using the below number or email address:
Phone: 020 8200 2500, press option 2
Email: [email protected]
Opening hours: Monday – Friday 9am – 5pm