Families lose health visits
Helen Gilbert
Wednesday, May 9, 2007
An estimated half a million visits to families by health visitors are not happening due to savage cuts in debt-ridden Primary Care Trusts, the Amicus/Community Practitioners and Health Visitors Association has warned. The union claims one health visitor job is being lost every day and calculates that more than 500,000 visits are not made.
The union claims one health visitor job is being lost every day and calculates that more than 500,000 visits are not made.
It follows NHS Workforce statistics, published last week, which showed a 4.5 per cent drop in the number of full-time equivalent (FTE) health visitors on the previous year.
The figures revealed there were 9,376 FTE health visitors in September 2006 compared with 9,809 in September 2005 - a loss of 433 FTE jobs.
Amicus health sector lead professional officer Dr Cheryll Adams described the situation as appalling and completely Tat odds with the Government's public health and family agendas'.
She said, This is particularly regrettable considering the good evidence base for the value of home visits. A Department of Health spokesperson said that a fundamental review of health visitor services was currently underway. This year alone, over 300 health visitors are being trained, and we expect this number to rise next year, she said.
