Local nurses to provide additional winter care for children and young people

Children’s nurses are working with GP practices to ensure children who are unwell can be seen quickly during the busy winter months.

Specialist nurse practitioners from the Children’s Community Nursing Team, part of Pennine Care NHS Foundation Trust, are now holding two new clinics every week to see children and young people aged up to 16 years.

The practices that are taking part in the pilot are Mark Street Surgery, Inspire Medical Centre, Dr Babar and partners, Dr Bhima’s practice, Dr Ghafoor and Dr Abbasi practice and Dr Hamid’s practice.

The clinics are run by children’s nurse practitioners who are equipped with enhanced skills enabling them to assess, diagnose and treat certain conditions, including coughs and colds, sore throats, rashes and high temperatures. They are also able to prescribe medication if required.

Lisa Reyburn, Service Lead for Pennine Care NHS Foundation Trust, said: “It’s well known that GPs face a huge amount of additional demand on their services during the winter, when mild to moderate illnesses are more common. We also know that attendance at local hospitals increases at this time of year, so we hope that these clinics will help to alleviate some of these pressures.

“We provide care for children and young people all year around and have the necessary skills to ensure that children can be seen quickly by a community-based service that can meet their needs.

“We’re pleased to be working in partnership with local GPs to achieve our mutual aim of ensuring they experience the very best health and wellbeing.”

Clinics will run from 1pm until 7pm every Monday and Friday at Rochdale’s Croft Shifa Health Centre.
If their child is unwell, parents should continue to contact their GP practice as normal. If there are no available appointments on a Monday or Friday the above practices will provide contact details for the nursing team if appropriate.

The project will run until Friday 28 February, 2014 and has been agreed with Heywood, Middleton and Rochdale Clinical Commissioning Group.

Dr Danielle Peet, NHS Heywood, Middleton and Rochdale Clinical Commissioning Group’s lead for children’s services, said: “The children's specialist nursing team model has been shown to reduce emergency admissions when working closely with GPs. It is designed to complement and support primary care and not replace the important work GP practices already do, treating children closer to home. This pilot will hopefully inform future service planning so any feedback is welcome.”