Comments on the article "Changing attitudes towards the care of children in hospital: a new assessment of the influence of the work of Bowlby and Robertson in the UK, 1940-1970" by Frank C.P. van der Horst and Rene van der Veer (Attachment and Human Development Vol 11, No 2, March 2009, 119-142)

Abstract

The authors give an impressive list of references, but these do not reflect the situation in the UK; most of those looking after children in hospital did not write about what they did or read about what others did. Children in hospital saw little or nothing of their parents, and once they had 'settled' the doctors and nurses were unaware of their distress. John Bowlby's interest in maternal deprivation led him to appoint James Robertson as his research assistant, to observe responses of young children to loss of maternal care on admission to hospital. They formulated the theoretical framework of the three stages through which the children went; protest, despair, and detachment constituting a developmental interference. Robertson was so concerned when nobody would listen that in 1952 he made the film 'A Two Year Old Goes to Hospital', which upset children's doctors and nurses. It also probably contributed to the government setting up in 1957 a Committee chaired by Sir Harry Platt to consider the Welfare of Children in Hospital. 'Going to Hospital with Mother' was made by Robertson in 1958. With Dermod MacCarthy he showed the films to the Committee, who accepted the suggestions in Robertson's Memorandum which included unrestricted visiting and mothers being admitted with their young children. The Report, known as the Platt Report, was published in 1959. Robertson could then show his films publicly, campaign in the media and encourage the pressure group NAWCH (the National Association for the Welfare of Children in Hospital) who were successful in getting many of the Committee's recommendations implemented, to the benefit of all children in hospital.