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Children's Health

Our vision for children's health stated:

Care for children will be provided as close to the home as possible within settings that are easily accessible for families. Only emergency/urgent care and highly specialised care will be delivered from a hospital setting and they will be looked after in a child-friendly environment by suitably trained and experienced staff.

Parents will know how to access care simply and swiftly through single points of access.

Teenagers will receive care in facilities that are appropriate for their needs and age rather than in either children’s or adult facilities. As they get older and move into adult services they will be well-educated about their ongoing health care needs and have a clear plan about how these will be met.

Children and teenagers who have a terminal illness will have real choice about where to die and parents will be given the right level of support to enable them to achieve this.

 

Our priorities for change:

  • Ensure the different organisations and clinical networks that provide care to children work together better.

  • Deliver more care outside of hospitals, for example at doctors’ surgeries, health centres, children’s centres and the home.

  • Give families better access to clinical staff specially trained to look after children such as health visitors and school nurses.

  • Improve the way we look after children with long term conditions as they grow older and need to transfer into adult services.

 

Our evidence for change:

There were 783,561 children under the age of 14 in the East Midlands at the last census. In a typical year, the average pre-school child will see their GP six times. Up to half of babies under 12 months and a quarter of older children will attend an emergency department in the same period.

Children’s health needs are changing evidenced by the emerging development of palliative care and the rising numbers of children with long term complex conditions.

There is a rising tide of behavioural problems; one in 10 children will experience a diagnosable mental health condition.

children's health

Other useful links:

Find out more about how we're transforming Children's cancer services

Check out how well children's health services are performing on quality through the East Midlands Quality Observatory