PUBLIC HEALTH DEPARTMENT: PERSONAL HEALTH SERVICES

Identity Statement

Reference code(s)	: LCC/PH/PHS
Held at	: London Metropolitan Archives   Click here to find out how to view this collection at https://www.cityoflondon.gov.uk/lma ›
Full title	: PUBLIC HEALTH DEPARTMENT: PERSONAL HEALTH SERVICES
Date(s)	: 1902-1963
Level of description	: Collection View parent record
Extent	: 2.83 linear metres
Name of creator(s)	: LCC | London County Council x London County Council

Context

Administrative/Biographical history:

Health services were transferred from the City and the boroughs to the London County Council, including maternity and child welfare, health visiting, home help, vaccination and immunisation, and the care of those with tuberculosis. The Council took over 4,843 lay and professional staff, 70 freehold premises, and 252 tenancy arrangements, as well as adding new services such as home nursing, the provision of health centres and the expansion of the ambulance service. The County was divided into nine divisions, each with a divisional health committee, a divisional medical officer, a nursing officer and an administrative officer.

The Council's maternity and child welfare centres provided ante-natal, post-natal and child welfare clinics, motherhood classes, nutrients, medicines and National Welfare Foods. Domiciliary midwives used the ante-natal clinics to examine their patients and book visits. Day nursery services were also provided. The child welfare service provided a diagnostic service for detecting mental and physical handicaps and offered psychiatric care.

In 1948 the Council became responsible for services for the prevention of tuberculosis and the care and after-care of tuberculous persons. Diagnostic and treatment services were transferred to the hospital authorities, but the Council paid parts of the salaries of chest physicians, and hired tuberculosis visitors and handicraft instructors. A BCG vaccination scheme was initiated for school children. Hostels were established for homeless men with tuberculosis who might be an infection risk for others. Diversional therapy classes were held at many chest clinics for patients able to travel. A service for homebound patients was also established. Tuberculosis health visitors saw patients in their homes, advised on diet and hygiene, ascertained home conditions and needs, provide extra nourishment and ensure patients attended clinic.

Before 1948 home helps were provided by boroughs for maternity cases and the sick and infirm. Under the National Health Service Act the Council took over this service and was empowered to provide help to any person who was ill, lying-in, an expectant mother, mentally defective, aged, or a child not over compulsory school age.

Content

Scope and content/abstract:

Records of the London County Council Public Health Department relating to personal health services, 1902-1963, including papers on Maternity and Child Welfare Clinics and Health Centres, including papers of individual clinics and brochure "Health Services and How to Obtain Them" (1958); papers relating to Domiciliary Midwifery Services including notices, rules, lists of certified Midwives, training, historical sketch of the service and the Midwives Bill, 1902; papers relating to day nurseries and home helps, including sample of applications for home helps and report on LCC Home Help Service by the National Institute of Houseworkers; papers regarding chest clinics for the treatment of tuberculosis, including sample of case papers for the boarding out of child tuberculosis patients, papers and case notes of tuberculosis patients, reports relating to tuberculosis and papers of individual chest clinics; papers relating to blind persons, including papers of the Departmental Committee on Welfare of the Blind, reports and schemes undertaken under the Blind Persons Act, 1920, papers on the prevention of blindness and investigation into myopia, the number and general classification of blind persons in London and ophthalmological research.

Access & Use

Language/scripts of material:
English

System of arrangement:

LCC/PH/PHS/01: Maternity and child welfare clinics; LCC/PH/PHS/02: Midwifery services; LCC/PH/PHS/03: Home helps; LCC/PH/PHS/04: Treatment of tuberculosis; LCC/PH/PHS/05: Blind persons.

Conditions governing access:

These records are available for public inspection, although records containing personal information are subject to access restrictions under the UK Data Protection Act, 1998.

Conditions governing reproduction:

Copyright: City of London

Finding aids:

Please see online catalogues at: http://search.lma.gov.uk/opac_lma/index.htm

Archival Information

Archival history:

Immediate source of acquisition:

Acquired with the records of its parent body, the London County Council.

Allied Materials

Related material:

Publication note:

For further information on the history of the LCC please see Achievement: A Short History of the London County Council by W Eric Jackson (1965), LMA Library reference 18.0 1965, The London County Council 1938, LMA Library reference 18.7 SER 4, and The Youngest County: A description of London as a county and its public services, 1951, LMA Library reference 18.0 1951.

Description Notes

Archivist's note:

Rules or conventions:
Compiled in compliance with General International Standard Archival Description, ISAD(G), second edition, 2000; National Council on Archives Rules for the Construction of Personal, Place and Corporate Names, 1997.

Date(s) of descriptions:
April to June 2009