STUPID MOTHERS

New Zealand Listener, Volume 28, Issue 725, 5 June 1953, Page 6

STUPID MOTHERS

S a doctor with many years’ experience in children’s wards I would say that daily visits would be an improvement on weekly visits only if the change were combined with some form of parent education to ensure that all parents behaved sensibly about it. (continued on next page)

(continued from previous page) Otherwise it might do more harm than good. One of our problems is the stupid mother who excites her child and gives it unsuitable food under the impression that she is helping its recovery. On the other hand, the idea of having a certain number of parents available to assist with the nursing of their own and other sick children has much to ‘commend it. I have found that the vast majority of children settle down in hospital perfectly well. It’s only on rare occasions that we decide that a child is pining and that the sooner it is home the better. There might be a few cases where a child would settle down a little better with daily visits, but in other cases the reverse would apply. So much depends on the amount of understanding the parent shows in handling the child so that it settles down in hospital. This also affects the amount of emotional disturbance shown by a child following hospitalisation. This is sometimes almost worse after short periods of separation from. the home where the situation and the procedure in hospital have hot been well enough explained beforehand. I think there are cases where personality damage does result, but where the situation is handled correctly by the parent there is really little permanent effect. I agree that the docile, tearless child is not necessarily in a good mental state, and we are always on the lookout for the child that is too "good."

A Senior Pediatrician