Information for Professionals
The Child Health Record is a valued part of child health practice in Victoria and reflects current child health policy and activities, meeting the needs of both parents and professionals. It is given free of charge to the mother at the place of their child's birth, so that the details of the baby's birth are recorded soon after birth.
The Child Health Record:
- Promotes public health issues such as immunisation
- Provides is a single repository of health and developmental information about a child from birth to school entry
- Enables doctors, nurses and other professionals to obtain details of previous consultations
- Provides parents with accurate health and development information about their child
- Facilitates communication between professionals and between parents and professionals
The CHR is a complete child health communication package incorporating the three main functions - child health information, record keeping and data collection. It consists of two components - a record for health and development assessments and a child health information guide.
Promoting health
The Child Health Information Guide contains valuable child health and developmental information including:
- Injury prevention
- Breastfeeding and infant nutrition
- Mothers' health and family diet
- Immunisation
- Sibling rivalry
- Child care
- Advice on children's behaviour
- Parenting practices
As a means for promoting health, the Child Health Record is a valuable educational resource for health professionals. It assists professionals to:
- Raise issues as a starting point for discussions about the health of the mother, child and the family generally
- Discuss with parents the progress of the child's health and development
- Explain the progress of the child's growth to the parents through the use of the include growth charts
Promoting partnerships
The Child Health Record has the potential to influence child health work practices and data collection systems in the public and private health and local government sectors. Through the use of the Record, parents and professionals are able to work together as partners to improve the health of the child. By using the Child Health Record they are encouraged to discuss openly all issues relevant to child health. In addition, professionals are able to refer any problems that are detected early for appropriate action.
This seciton of the site includes information on: