Women and children first: international maternal and infant welfare

motherhood-the medical practitioners who made their careers as "experts". Other than the work of Canadian paediatricians Helen MacMurchy and William Blatz in addition to the work of Dr Benjamin Spock (who is not Canadian), little attention is paid to the historically vexing problem of documenting what occurs between mother and paediatrician at a well-child conference during the years studied. When one considers that the dynamics between mother and "expert" are profoundly separated during the reading of a tract on childcare advice, the problem of offering individualized advice becomes much larger. Indeed, the over-used but hardly hegemonic baby care advice adage, "Consult your physician" takes on new meaning when considering that the authors writing the advice are addressing an unknown and unexamined patient and parent.