Re: I thought people might be interested in this.

[Guest guest]

Thanks Ruth, that was really useful and thinking along the lines I have been. I am now in the process of doing Brazelton training and hope to incorporate that into my practice where appropriate.

Ann

I thought people might be interested in this.

Parents warned about “unhelpful teaching”

Parents who teach their pre-school children to read, write and add could be setting them up for mental health problems later in life, the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health says. A report issued today (04/04/03) encourages patients to interact with their infants through informal play, but warns against adopting a formal teaching approach. The study investigates why so many children have emotional and behavioural problems at a time when they are healthier and better educated than ever. It blames “unhelpful parenting practices” and a lack of understanding among parents of child development.(The Times 04/04/03; p.19)© HMG Worldwide 2003http://www.health-news.co.uk/

Babies of divorced parents suffer

”Babies forced to spend nights in the separate homes of divorced or separated parents often suffer emotional and physical anguish, according to new research. Such infants have more tantrums, develop eating and sleeping disorders, and exhibit distress through symptoms such as raised heartbeats. They also fail to identify their mothers as a source of comfort because they are confused by her regular absences. The findings were made in the world’s first study of how infants’ attachment to their parents is affected by overnight stays.(The Daily Telegraph 04/04/03; p.13)© HMG Worldwide 2003http://www.health-news.co.uk/

[Guest guest]

Thanks Ruth, that was really useful and thinking along the lines I have been. I am now in the process of doing Brazelton training and hope to incorporate that into my practice where appropriate.

Ann

I thought people might be interested in this.

Parents warned about “unhelpful teaching”

Parents who teach their pre-school children to read, write and add could be setting them up for mental health problems later in life, the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health says. A report issued today (04/04/03) encourages patients to interact with their infants through informal play, but warns against adopting a formal teaching approach. The study investigates why so many children have emotional and behavioural problems at a time when they are healthier and better educated than ever. It blames “unhelpful parenting practices” and a lack of understanding among parents of child development.(The Times 04/04/03; p.19)© HMG Worldwide 2003http://www.health-news.co.uk/

Babies of divorced parents suffer

”Babies forced to spend nights in the separate homes of divorced or separated parents often suffer emotional and physical anguish, according to new research. Such infants have more tantrums, develop eating and sleeping disorders, and exhibit distress through symptoms such as raised heartbeats. They also fail to identify their mothers as a source of comfort because they are confused by her regular absences. The findings were made in the world’s first study of how infants’ attachment to their parents is affected by overnight stays.(The Daily Telegraph 04/04/03; p.13)© HMG Worldwide 2003http://www.health-news.co.uk/

[Guest guest]

, I hope you will not mind me passing on the notes

from the meeting of the associate parliamentary group on parenting that I

attended on behalf of the Parenting and Family Support Interest Group a couple of weeks ago,

because so much that was said there is relevant to this discussion. The

meeting was, essentially, preliminary to the forthcoming green paper on children

at risk, but there was huge amount of discussion about workforce and how

children's services are set to change as 'children's centres' are set up.

These are going to learn from the Sure Start model, but

will be for all children, not just a defined area. Key purposes will be

about children's health, emotional, social and educational development. They

will have to be multi-agency but there is a lot of interest in the use of

schools as bases (remember a brief discussion on Senate about health services

within 'extended schools' a couple of months back?)

There was some discussion about the need for government

departments to be 'joined up' to ensure that all policies take children into

account. There were also questions about the development of a new, multi-disciplinary

'child and family support' worker; this is still under discussion and is

also being considered as part of the childrn's NSF, but (in this meeting,

anyway!) there was clarity about three things:

1. all workers (including voluntary sector) involved with children need

a core of knowledge and skills

2. there is a need for a 'climbing frame' approach (much nicer descriptor

than the NHS 'skills escalator'!) to achieving this so that people can step

into and out of education, allowing an approach to building a career that

is compatible with family responsibilities

3. there is a need for a 'professional' level to ensure accountability, competence,

conduct etc.

Baroness Ashton, who is the minister with responsibility

for early years, was well aware of the constraints around the new nursing/health

visiting professional register that will prevent health visitors and school

nurses from being part of this flexible way of working; but too astute an

operator (in light of the earlier comments about 'joined up working') to

say anything that would drop her colleagues in Department of Health 'in it'!

kind regards

-----Original

Message-----

From: Bidmead [mailto:christine@...]

Sent: 06 May 2003 10:23

Subject: Re:

I thought people might be interested in this.

Dear ,

Unfortunately what Supporting families did was to give us the Governments aspirations for supporting

families rather than the resources to do it!

I was

at the launch of a new report produced by the National Family and Parenting

Institute with the ph Rowntree Foundation a month

or so ago. ¡ÆGovernment and Parenting¡Ç. It is quite a fascinating read. You

can download it free from the ph Rowntree Foundation website. www.jrf.org.uk

The report

outlines a case for the introduction of a code for parent¡Çs rights and responsibilities. It contains points that will be of particular interest

to health visitors. I will summarise some of these.

The United

Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child to which out government is

a signatory states the following in Article 24

¡ÆState

parties recognise the right of the child to the enjoyment of the highest

attainable standard of health and to facilities for treatment of illness

and rehabilitation of health¡Ä¡Ç

¡ÆState

parties¡Äshall take appropriate measures to ensure appropriate pre-natal and

post-natal health care for mothers¡Ç.

In broad

terms these are the health provisions that can be classified as an indisputable

right to support that parents can expect from the state.

In ¡ÆSupporting

Families¡Ç we saw the government indicating its intention to place a greater

emphasis on the role of health visitors, extending their functions from a

health focus to offering advice and support to families across a range of

psychological and social issues that arise around the birth of a child. A preventative approach was being advocated and a new

role for health visitors was advocated. A 'new role'

that some of us were very familiar with but had sadly been lost with more

working to the medical model particularly since the advent of GP fundholding

etc. Progress with this 'new role' can be seen through

various pilots, the creation of leadership posts and the development of the

health visitor resource pack encompassing a wider support approach. However according to the report it cannot be said that

the changes to date constitute a universal advance in service benefits for

parents. The National Mapping of Family services (Henricson

et al 2001) found that parental entitlements to pre and post-natal support

were not being realised, and the aspirations set out in the DoH nursing strategy

for England, ¡ÆMaking a Difference¡Ç to extend post-natal support visits to

weekly for the first six weeks would be unlikely to be achieved within current

resource levels.

While

the intention may be there, it is yet to be fulfilled in many areas. There is in fact little hope of universal realisation

of this aspiration within the foreseeable future because the numbers of health

visitors are in fact 5% lower now than they were in the 1980s although the

downward trend in numbers has been halted we still have some way to go before

we have all the workforce we need. Hence the mooted

new generic 'families and parenting worker' that is being talked about and

I guess planned for in the new green paper on children at risk which will

be published shortly.

But what

of parent¡Çs rights to support? Here is another document. There is the Council of Europe¡Çs recommendations on the

support parents should expect from the state. The

Committee of Ministers Recommendation (No. R (79) 17) Concerning the Protection

of Children Against ill Treatment, lays expectations on the state to promote

family welfare and makes detailed recommendations as to the sort of support

which should be provided during the pre- and post-natal period to foster

parent-child emotional attachment.

Perhaps

motivation to secure delivery of adequate pre- and post-natal support might

just be enhanced by its specification as a right enshrined in a parental code. Guidance in such a code might include specifications relating

to:

1.

Antenatal classes

2.

Post-natal support –level and period of access

3.

Access to parenting information sessions in schools

4.

Access to parenting education classes or therapeutic support if

child behaviour management difficulties emerge

5.

The provision of written material, such as Pregnancy and birth

to five books produced for all expectant parents by the DoH, and a possible

sequel to these to cover the later stages of childhood, in particular adolescence.

Because

so much more is known now about the importance of early attachment and parent/child

relationships it is surely one of our duties as health visitors ¡Æto influence

policies affecting health¡Ç and to campaign vigorously to ensure that parent¡Çs

entitlements are met by an adequately trained and competent workforce consisting

not only of health visitors but certainly led and supported by them. Our

universal access to families puts us in a prime position to do this.

Best wishes,

Re:

I thought people might be interested in this.

Margaret, what

a brilliant idea. Where shall we start? I may have some interest here in

cambridge in my ideas but these are embryonic at the moment

Ann

[Guest guest]

, I hope you will not mind me passing on the notes

from the meeting of the associate parliamentary group on parenting that I

attended on behalf of the Parenting and Family Support Interest Group a couple of weeks ago,

because so much that was said there is relevant to this discussion. The

meeting was, essentially, preliminary to the forthcoming green paper on children

at risk, but there was huge amount of discussion about workforce and how

children's services are set to change as 'children's centres' are set up.

These are going to learn from the Sure Start model, but

will be for all children, not just a defined area. Key purposes will be

about children's health, emotional, social and educational development. They

will have to be multi-agency but there is a lot of interest in the use of

schools as bases (remember a brief discussion on Senate about health services

within 'extended schools' a couple of months back?)

There was some discussion about the need for government

departments to be 'joined up' to ensure that all policies take children into

account. There were also questions about the development of a new, multi-disciplinary

'child and family support' worker; this is still under discussion and is

also being considered as part of the childrn's NSF, but (in this meeting,

anyway!) there was clarity about three things:

1. all workers (including voluntary sector) involved with children need

a core of knowledge and skills

2. there is a need for a 'climbing frame' approach (much nicer descriptor

than the NHS 'skills escalator'!) to achieving this so that people can step

into and out of education, allowing an approach to building a career that

is compatible with family responsibilities

3. there is a need for a 'professional' level to ensure accountability, competence,

conduct etc.

Baroness Ashton, who is the minister with responsibility

for early years, was well aware of the constraints around the new nursing/health

visiting professional register that will prevent health visitors and school

nurses from being part of this flexible way of working; but too astute an

operator (in light of the earlier comments about 'joined up working') to

say anything that would drop her colleagues in Department of Health 'in it'!

kind regards

-----Original

Message-----

From: Bidmead [mailto:christine@...]

Sent: 06 May 2003 10:23

Subject: Re:

I thought people might be interested in this.

Dear ,

Unfortunately what Supporting families did was to give us the Governments aspirations for supporting

families rather than the resources to do it!

I was

at the launch of a new report produced by the National Family and Parenting

Institute with the ph Rowntree Foundation a month

or so ago. ¡ÆGovernment and Parenting¡Ç. It is quite a fascinating read. You

can download it free from the ph Rowntree Foundation website. www.jrf.org.uk

The report

outlines a case for the introduction of a code for parent¡Çs rights and responsibilities. It contains points that will be of particular interest

to health visitors. I will summarise some of these.

The United

Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child to which out government is

a signatory states the following in Article 24

¡ÆState

parties recognise the right of the child to the enjoyment of the highest

attainable standard of health and to facilities for treatment of illness

and rehabilitation of health¡Ä¡Ç

¡ÆState

parties¡Äshall take appropriate measures to ensure appropriate pre-natal and

post-natal health care for mothers¡Ç.

In broad

terms these are the health provisions that can be classified as an indisputable

right to support that parents can expect from the state.

In ¡ÆSupporting

Families¡Ç we saw the government indicating its intention to place a greater

emphasis on the role of health visitors, extending their functions from a

health focus to offering advice and support to families across a range of

psychological and social issues that arise around the birth of a child. A preventative approach was being advocated and a new

role for health visitors was advocated. A 'new role'

that some of us were very familiar with but had sadly been lost with more

working to the medical model particularly since the advent of GP fundholding

etc. Progress with this 'new role' can be seen through

various pilots, the creation of leadership posts and the development of the

health visitor resource pack encompassing a wider support approach. However according to the report it cannot be said that

the changes to date constitute a universal advance in service benefits for

parents. The National Mapping of Family services (Henricson

et al 2001) found that parental entitlements to pre and post-natal support

were not being realised, and the aspirations set out in the DoH nursing strategy

for England, ¡ÆMaking a Difference¡Ç to extend post-natal support visits to

weekly for the first six weeks would be unlikely to be achieved within current

resource levels.

While

the intention may be there, it is yet to be fulfilled in many areas. There is in fact little hope of universal realisation

of this aspiration within the foreseeable future because the numbers of health

visitors are in fact 5% lower now than they were in the 1980s although the

downward trend in numbers has been halted we still have some way to go before

we have all the workforce we need. Hence the mooted

new generic 'families and parenting worker' that is being talked about and

I guess planned for in the new green paper on children at risk which will

be published shortly.

But what

of parent¡Çs rights to support? Here is another document. There is the Council of Europe¡Çs recommendations on the

support parents should expect from the state. The

Committee of Ministers Recommendation (No. R (79) 17) Concerning the Protection

of Children Against ill Treatment, lays expectations on the state to promote

family welfare and makes detailed recommendations as to the sort of support

which should be provided during the pre- and post-natal period to foster

parent-child emotional attachment.

Perhaps

motivation to secure delivery of adequate pre- and post-natal support might

just be enhanced by its specification as a right enshrined in a parental code. Guidance in such a code might include specifications relating

to:

1.

Antenatal classes

2.

Post-natal support –level and period of access

3.

Access to parenting information sessions in schools

4.

Access to parenting education classes or therapeutic support if

child behaviour management difficulties emerge

5.

The provision of written material, such as Pregnancy and birth

to five books produced for all expectant parents by the DoH, and a possible

sequel to these to cover the later stages of childhood, in particular adolescence.

Because

so much more is known now about the importance of early attachment and parent/child

relationships it is surely one of our duties as health visitors ¡Æto influence

policies affecting health¡Ç and to campaign vigorously to ensure that parent¡Çs

entitlements are met by an adequately trained and competent workforce consisting

not only of health visitors but certainly led and supported by them. Our

universal access to families puts us in a prime position to do this.

Best wishes,

Re:

I thought people might be interested in this.

Margaret, what

a brilliant idea. Where shall we start? I may have some interest here in

cambridge in my ideas but these are embryonic at the moment

Ann

[Guest guest]

Hi ,

Not at all. They do seem highly relevant and what I was alluding to in my email about the child and family support worker. If the DoH do not get behind us on developing these teams of broad based support from a wider background than nursing and helping to implement these new services then I am afraid we will have missed the boat! As I said in my email in response to health visitors do have that universal contact with families and are in an unequalled position to mobilise other community resources. Many will find themselves working with some of our most vulnerable families simply because there are no services which are available or acceptable to them. A couple of years ago when I was working in East London even a child on the child protection register did not necessarily mean that the family had an allocated social worker or that the family received the support necessary. I hope things have moved on a bit since then but my fear is that things will not have changed significantly, hence the perceived need to formulate new services with new workers and the children at risk green paper, which is eagerly awaited.

In response to I would just like to say that there are others being employed in health visiting teams who would gladly like the opportunity to train as health visitors but who cannot e.g. nursery nurses and eventually the new parent and family support workers. What is an interesting anomaly however is that a direct entry midwife may train as a health visitor even though she would not be nor call herself a nurse. As says in her email there is a real need for a 'climbing frame' approach to education so that workers employed in the community may progress and develop their careers. This does not mean that nurses should not become health visitors but that they are one of a number of groups who could become health visitors.

Best wishes,

RE: I thought people might be interested in this.

There is a lot of interest in changing the focus of the new birth visit in lots of areas, but I think we have to be careful that discussion doesn¡Çt end up being around getting rid of the new birth visit altogether rather than replacing it with something better. Also I think we do have to remember that when we¡Çre talking about supporting the development of sensitive reciprocal relationships that it does take time both from the point of view of the professional parent relationship and the parent-baby relationship to build trust, empathy and mutual understanding. There are so many factors that can cloud the early days for parents and babies and it does take time to explore what they might be before either can move on to mutual affect regulation that I believe more time is required early on if we are really to make a difference to the quality of the relationship rather than try to offer solutions when we don¡Çt even really know what the problem is!! (the need for containment, as referred to in the Solihull Approach) Whatever happened to the recommendations in the Supporting Families green paper which advocated weekly visits by a health visitor from her first encounter with the family up until the baby is 6 weeks old?

Lowenhoff

-----Original Message-----From: Ann GIRLING [mailto:annieg@...] Sent: 07 April 2003 19:51 Subject: Re: I thought people might be interested in this.

Margaret, what a brilliant idea. Where shall we start? I may have some interest here in cambridge in my ideas but these are embryonic at the moment

Ann

[Guest guest]

Hi ,

Not at all. They do seem highly relevant and what I was alluding to in my email about the child and family support worker. If the DoH do not get behind us on developing these teams of broad based support from a wider background than nursing and helping to implement these new services then I am afraid we will have missed the boat! As I said in my email in response to health visitors do have that universal contact with families and are in an unequalled position to mobilise other community resources. Many will find themselves working with some of our most vulnerable families simply because there are no services which are available or acceptable to them. A couple of years ago when I was working in East London even a child on the child protection register did not necessarily mean that the family had an allocated social worker or that the family received the support necessary. I hope things have moved on a bit since then but my fear is that things will not have changed significantly, hence the perceived need to formulate new services with new workers and the children at risk green paper, which is eagerly awaited.

In response to I would just like to say that there are others being employed in health visiting teams who would gladly like the opportunity to train as health visitors but who cannot e.g. nursery nurses and eventually the new parent and family support workers. What is an interesting anomaly however is that a direct entry midwife may train as a health visitor even though she would not be nor call herself a nurse. As says in her email there is a real need for a 'climbing frame' approach to education so that workers employed in the community may progress and develop their careers. This does not mean that nurses should not become health visitors but that they are one of a number of groups who could become health visitors.

Best wishes,

RE: I thought people might be interested in this.

There is a lot of interest in changing the focus of the new birth visit in lots of areas, but I think we have to be careful that discussion doesn¡Çt end up being around getting rid of the new birth visit altogether rather than replacing it with something better. Also I think we do have to remember that when we¡Çre talking about supporting the development of sensitive reciprocal relationships that it does take time both from the point of view of the professional parent relationship and the parent-baby relationship to build trust, empathy and mutual understanding. There are so many factors that can cloud the early days for parents and babies and it does take time to explore what they might be before either can move on to mutual affect regulation that I believe more time is required early on if we are really to make a difference to the quality of the relationship rather than try to offer solutions when we don¡Çt even really know what the problem is!! (the need for containment, as referred to in the Solihull Approach) Whatever happened to the recommendations in the Supporting Families green paper which advocated weekly visits by a health visitor from her first encounter with the family up until the baby is 6 weeks old?

Lowenhoff

-----Original Message-----From: Ann GIRLING [mailto:annieg@...] Sent: 07 April 2003 19:51 Subject: Re: I thought people might be interested in this.

Margaret, what a brilliant idea. Where shall we start? I may have some interest here in cambridge in my ideas but these are embryonic at the moment

Ann