Thanks for posting. I would be really interested in this also as need something that captures birth rate, hcp contacts, universal plus work and deprivation impacting on health and service delivery. Had a look recently for weighting tools and can’t find anything really that supports the 456 model of health visiting.

Zoe. Elaine McInnes is coordinating interested parties to develop a Good Practice Point on this topic, so she’d love to hear from you.

Esther, I’m working with other iHV staff team members to develop a an easy guide to questions and answers about evidence for health visiting.

Good question and one that is exercising many of us as this appears to be happening around the country sadly. Many organisations like the IHV and others are working hard to provide evidence for members to share with comossioners the evidence, outcomes and value of the work HVs do.

It is an area many of the Fellows are working proactively at, are you a Felliw or can you support local fellows to influence comossioners and others.

Weeks like Infant Mental Health Week in June and national health visiting week September 26-30th are weeks when we raise the profile of the work HVs do on a national scale.

Look out for the IHV resources on the website and keep reading that Associate Newsletter, to keep you up to date with the latest news you need to know about. Viv Bennets blog has some great case studies on the value of health visiting you can’t use locally. I am sure you have local examples as well.

Professionally we need to stay to strong and focused on what we do and be able to clearly and succinctly articulate the value of our contribution. Times are tough, Viv Bennet is keen to hear about local examples of good practice and case studies and also where HVs services are under threat, you can follow her on her blog or Twitter.

Follow the IHV on Twitter & Facebook to keep you abreast of the latest developments. I I firmly believe we must all stand together. Do keep posting.

We post parents the ASQ questionnaires to parents prior to the 10 month and 2year review appointments and then go through them with the parents and child at the review. i don’t see there would be any difference between posting and emailing the ASQ questionnaires providing the review is completed with parent and child present. Is that what you’ve been asked Maggie?

Hi Lindsay, was it anything in particular you wanted to focus on eg the emotional development of a baby or recognising baby states? The Getting to Know your baby website may be helpful https://aimh.org.uk/parent-resources/) to help them begin to understand the baby’s cues and what they may be trying to communicate. There is quite a lot on here around reflective functioning and helping the parent to begin to understand the baby’s mental state which I would think a parent with autism will particularly struggle with.
For you as a practitioner, this site may be helpful to give you an insight into how it feels to be autistic and a mother. http://autismwomensnetwork.org/motherhood-autistic-parenting/
Hopefully some of this is helpful.

Hi Sylvia, any more info would be great! Yes, we are also keen to know how best to introduce it. Parents are scored on warmth/invasiveness and I’m not sure how that would be communicated to parents without increasing anxiety or causing alienation from HV service. It needs to be sensitively thought through. I will also have a look at IMH training materials, thanks.

Hi Fleur are you able to share your new leaflet I feel we overload parents with leaflets and most end up in the recycling!

I know they introduced it in Wiltshire last year, will try and get some feedback. We are also looking at introducing an attachment tool at 6-8 week contact. How do we introduce it to parents without raising their anxiety, what happens if concerns are raised in terms of onward referral and support, can we really assess attachment at one contact – I don’t think so? I am also looking at more HV observational type attachment assessments, we are already using the materials from the excellent iHV Infant Mental Health Training.

Thanks