Children's Day Hospital

The Children's Day Hospital, or more properly, the Psychiatric Day Hospital for Children and their Families at 35 Black Prince Road, Vauxhall, London was a South London out-patient resource under the aegis of St Thomas' Hospital and the NHS between 1965 and 1990 when it closed. Coincidentally, its existence was co-terminous with that of the Inner London Education Authority, with whose 'Special Schools' service, based in nearby County Hall, there was occasional co-operation. The Day Hospital's distinction was to provide evidence-based treatment added to the Waldorf School system, combined with the prescription of newly developed antidepressant medication to children.[1]

The Psychiatric Day Hospital for Children and their Families
Detail of 35 Black Prince Road
Location within Lambeth
Geography
Location35, Black Prince Road, Vauxhall, London, England
Coordinates51.4901°N 0.1154°W / 51.4901; -0.1154
Organisation
Care systemNHS England
Affiliated universitySt Thomas' Medical School and Nightingale School of Nursing
Services
Emergency departmentNo
History
Opened1916 as the Babies' Hostel, 1965 as day facility
Closed1990
Links
ListsHospitals in England

History

Origins

In a Grade II listed neo-Georgian two-storey building designed in 1913 by Adshead and Ramsey on the Duchy of Cornwall estate in Kennington, a babies' hostel was opened in 1916.[2] For a brief period at the end of World War I, it became the Maxillo-Facial Hospital for wounded soldiers.[3][4] In 1919, it reverted to its original purpose as a children's nursery. In 1922 wards were opened for babies with feeding problems and the hostel became known as the 'Dietetic Hospital for Sick Babies and Mothers'. At the same time, a training school for nursery nurses was started.[5]

In 1924 Mrs Elizabeth Mitchison passed the lease on the building to the nearby St. Thomas' Hospital in Waterloo in memory of her son, Lieutenant Anthony Mitchison. The hospital was then renamed 'St Thomas's Cornwall Babies' Hostel. It was renamed again in 1927 as the St Thomas's Babies Hospital, becoming affiliated to the Association of Nursery Training Colleges.[6] The hospital offered in-patient treatment for children up to the age of three, diagnosed as premature, malnourished or dyspeptic.[7]

In 1930 an out-patient department was opened where mothers could also be examined and treated. In 1931 33 mothers and 97 children were admitted of whom 22 cases were for the re-establishment of breast-feeding. There were almost 500 out-patient attendances.[8] With the out-break of the Second world war, between 1939 and 1946 the hospital was evacuated first to Crickdale in Wiltshire then in 1942 to Hog's Back in Surrey.[6] In 1962 the hospital began to offer a three-days a week service to disturbed children up to 5 years of age and their parents.[9]

The Psychiatric Day Hospital for Children

In 1965, with the arrival at St Thomas' Hospital of innovative consultant child psychiatrist, Dr. Eva Frommer, the children's hospital was renamed again, this time as the 'Psychiatric Day Hospital for Children and their Families' and provided full-time out-patient treatment to primary-age children referred to the Department of Child Psychiatry at St. Thomas'. The Sister-in-Charge of the Day Hospital from then on until 1987, was Mrs Mary Reid SRN.[10] The understanding of child development that guided treatment was inspired by Rudolf Steiner and as practised in Waldorf schools.[11] In time, this unique combination attracted attention from across the country and internationally. Professor Kemal Çakmakli, MD has applied Day Hospital techniques in Turkey.[12][13] The tradition of staff training continued for all disciplines, including: nursery nurses, primary-school teachers, speech therapists, art therapists, music therapists and eurythmy teachers.[14] Other attending staff included, educational psychologists, psychiatric social workers and educational and local government social services staff, as well as senior registrars in child psychiatry on rotation.[15][16] The Day hospital worked closely with the paediatric department at the main hospital.[17]

The guiding principles were that all young children needed to acquire the skills of understanding and self-expression according to an age-appropriate adjustment to the outside world. The best way to achieve this was through the arts. If this failed, some children could become exceedingly frustrated or depressed.[18] Dr. Frommer was one of the earliest practitioners in the field to identify childhood depression.[19] Her treatment model consisted of exposing her patients to colour, sound, movement, story-telling and in a minority of cases, also to the prescription of antidepressants.[20] This was a controversial approach that attracted both international interest and local criticism from some colleagues.[21] However, Dr Frommer consulted with the children when they felt ready to come off their medication. The Day Hospital and its community activities became a much loved institution and oasis in the concrete jungle that had arisen around it in Lambeth after wartime bombing and the austerity that followed.[22]

Its approach was in marked contrast to the then dominant influence of Kleinian Psychoanalysis in the Child Guidance Movement, as practised for instance, at the Tavistock Clinic, or the other contrasting approach practised at the Anna Freud Centre, both in North London.[23] In the late 1980s the Day Hospital's influence began to wane as Dr. Frommer's energy became severely limited through her illness. She retired in 1989.[24] A year later, the Day Hospital was closed.[25] Although successors were appointed at the main hospital out-patient clinic, the anthroposophic inspiration was gone.[26]

Present Day Provision

After repeated restructuring in the NHS, the Black Prince Road building is now called 'William Geoffrey House' and is used by Lambeth Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS), managed by the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust.[27]

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References
  1. Edelman, Hope. (2012) Motherless Mothers: Mother Loss shapes the Parents we become. UK: Hachette. 978-073362-879-5. p.103
  2. "Grade II statutory list" (PDF). London Borough of Lambeth. Retrieved 21 December 2016.
  3. 'Face and Jaw Wounds. Free Treatment for discharged Soldiers and Sailors'. British Journal of Nursing, 30 September 1916, p. 272.
  4. Reports by the Joint War Committee and the Joint War Finance Committee of the British Red Cross Society and the Order of St John of Jerusalem in England, 1914–1919. London: HMSO. (Reprinted in facsimile, 2005. The Naval and Military Press Ltd. in association with the Imperial War Museum).
  5. "St Thomas' Babies' Hostel". British Medical Journal. 2 (3690): 584–585. 26 September 1931. PMC 2314970.
  6. "The Psychiatric Day Hospital for Children and their Families". Lost Hospitals of London. Retrieved 21 December 2016.
  7. BMJ, 2, (3690).
  8. BMJ, 2, (3690).
  9. "Saint Thomas' Hospital: Babies Hospital". National Archives. Retrieved 23 December 2016.
  10. Frommer, E.A. (1967). "A Day Hospital for Disturbed Children Under Five". The Lancet. 289 (7486): 377–379. doi:10.1016/s0140-6736(67)92912-1. PMID 4163782.
  11. Steiner, R. The Education of the Child, (1907) ISBN 0-85440-620-4
  12. Çakmakli, Kemal. "Influence of Dr. Frommer and the Day Hospital In Turkish". Archived from the original on 24 December 2016. Retrieved 21 December 2016.
  13. Subotsky, Fiona. (2005) 'Eva Frommer, Former Consultant in Child Psychiatry at St Thomas' Hospital, London.' Obituary: Bulletin of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, . Retrieved 20 December 2016
  14. Pratt, Drue (2012) Obituary of Doreen Hynes, Camphill Correspondence, https://s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/articles-and-essays/CC-Archive/SepOct-2012.pdf p.15. Retrieved 21 December 2016.
  15. Roberts, Howard, (Senior Reglstrar) and Ellis, Virginia, (Nursery Nurse/Therapist) ~ Children's Psychiatric Day Hospital, St. Thomas' Hospital, London S.E.1. 'Minor Neurological Disability and Child Neglect – A Case History'. Child Abuse and Neglect, Vol. 3, 0145-2134/79/0901 Pergamon Press Ltd. 1979. pp. 1001–1083.
  16. Frommer, E.A. (1972) Diagnosis and Treatment in Clinical Child Psychiatry, London: Heinemann Educational Books. ISBN 9780433109105
  17. Buchanan, Ann and Clayden, Graham. (1992) Children who soil: Assessment and Treatment. Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Son Ltd. ISBN 978-0471934-790
  18. Frommer, E.A. (1969) Voyage through Childhood into the Adult World – A Guide to Child Development, London: Pergamon. ISBN 9781869890599
  19. Frommer, E.A., Mendelson, W.B. and Reid, M.A. 'Differential diagnosis of psychiatric disturbances in pre-school children'. Br. J. Psychiatry. 1972; 121: 71–74.
  20. Nash-Wortham, M. and Hunt, J. (2008) Take Time: Movement Exercises for Parents, Teachers and Therapists of Children with Difficulties in Speaking, Reading, Writing and Spelling. UK: Robinswood Press. ISBN 9781906053802
  21. Graham, Philip. (1967) Correspondence about Childhood Depression and Dr. E. Frommer's clinical trial of antidepressants: British medical Journal
  22. "Green, Malcolm. Slum clearance in Kennington and Vauxhall" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 17 July 2016. Retrieved 22 December 2016.
  23. "History". The Anna Freud Centre. Archived from the original on 13 March 2012. Retrieved 14 February 2012.
  24. Subotsky (2005)
  25. National Archives – Hospital Record Database
  26. South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust: 'Annual Report and Accounts 2015–16' . Retrieved 22 December 2016
  27. Lambeth CAMHS on Young Lambeth Website: . Retrieved 23 December 2016


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