Tresillian Petersham (1921 - 1997)

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The first Tresillian, at Petersham, was run by Dr Margaret Harper, the Society's first Medical Director. From that point the Society, and its nurses, adopted the name Tresillian.

In the 1960s Tresillian Petersham housed 10 mothers with breastfed babies at any given time, along with eight artificially fed babies and, by the 1960s, five premature babies. Over the course of the year it cared for more than 130 mothers and 220 babies.

Tresillian housed babies who were waiting for adoption in the 1960s. These babies were under the care of other agencies, including the Child Welfare Department.

The Petersham site closed in 1997 and moved to a new site in the grounds of Canterbury Hospital. As well as the Willoughby and Wollstonecraft sites, in 2013 Tresillian also operates at Penrith.

Records

Medical records for Tresillian centres at Willoughby, Wollstonecraft, Canterbury and Penrith are kept for approximately 30 years. Medical records from Petersham are kept in secondary storage and date from the 1980s to 1997.