274 MEDICAL SECTION 



a necessity an enormous bulk of voluntary work; first rate, 

 constructive, scientific, voluntary work. I am a very strong 

 believer indeed in the voluntary agency. I have seen the 

 splendid results, and I am a strong believer in the influences 

 which are brought to bear upon the problem by what is 

 called the layman, who is animated by high motives, and 

 who brings to bear his or her influence in this great work. 

 We are extremely anxious that the members of the Con- 

 ference will not hesitate to discuss the papers, for we want 

 to transact real business. 



THE NECESSITY OF IMPROVING THE 

 TRAINING OF MIDWIVES, AND ITS 

 BEARING UPON INFANT LIFE. 



BY Miss ALICE GREGORY. 



Hon. Secretary of the Council for the Higher Training of Midwives. 



I DO not suppose that there is any subject on which 

 the public are so profoundly ignorant as the training 

 of midwives, on what is the essential difference 

 between a good training and a bad one, and this 

 is probably the reason why we are content with 

 regard to at least one half of their work, the care 

 of the infant that England as a country should 

 remain archaic in its methods and deplorable in its 

 results. 



Ask the ordinary nurse, who has just passed the 

 Central Midwives Board examination, as to her 

 training, and her answer will probably be : " We had 

 a first-rate training ; I saw [some prodigious number] 

 cases in my three [or four] months, and I had a 

 splendid lot of abnormalities." 



If pressed on the subject of her infants, she may 

 add in an offhand manner : " Oh, they did all right ; 

 of course some of the bottle-fed ones died, and the 

 prematures much better they should. Yes, we 

 always gave milk and barley-water i in 3 that is the 

 only thing for these hand-fed children." And one 



