Healthy Child Programme

Overview

The Healthy Child Programme is the main universal health service for improving the health and wellbeing of children and young people through health and development reviews, health promotion and parenting support.

In Leicester, the 0-19 Healthy Child Programmes are public health programmes provided by professionals through the following services:

0-5 Healthy Child Programme
Health Visiting Service - Children aged 0-5 years and their families
Family Nurse Partnership Service - a home visiting service for some teenagers pregnant with their first child

5-19 Healthy Child Programme
School Aged Nursing Service - children aged 5-19 years and their families

These services offer ALL children, young people and their families a programme of developmental checks, information and guidance to support parenting and healthy choices.

Why your views matter

We want to find out what you think of a new way of delivering one integrated 0-19 Healthy Child Programme, which will provide a better, more joined up way of delivering these essential services.

You have already told us what you think about some aspects of the provision of these services in Leicester, through facilitated focus groups, questionnaire completion and soft market testing.  For example, you said that you wanted more clarity on who your child's Public Health Nurse is and how to contact them. We have included this in the new proposal.

The new model for the Healthy Child Programme will not only improve coordination across health visiting, school nursing and support for vulnerable families but also integrate the delivery of other services within it i.e. breastfeeding peer support service, oral health promotion resources, healthy schools, heathy tots.

We won’t use the terms Health Visitors and School Nurses, we will be using the term Public Health Nurses, this is to create an integrated workforce with one identity, and a team that can respond more to the needs of your child and your family, for example some children are home educated and the term ‘school nurse’ doesn’t connect with them, also, currently Health Visitors work with children till they are 5, then school nurses take over. In the new model, Health Visitors who have a rapport with the family might carry on working with them once the child enters school, or school nurses might begin working with a 2 year old to help them be ready for school entry.

We are also proposing a shift in skill mix between Health Visitors and Nursery Nurses within 4 years (due to natural staff turnover rather than service re-design).  The impact on parents and children is that for some appointments, especially where extra support is required (e.g. around sleep or behaviour) they will see a Nursery Nurse rather than a Health Visitor.  Nursery Nurses are trained, qualified and skilled professionals.

In summary the proposed changes in the new model are as follows:

The key benefits of the proposed new model of delivering the Healthy Child Programme in Leicester are:

• to create one integrated public health nurse workforce across Leicester, delivered under a single contract - meaning the team can respond more quickly and effectively to children's needs
• that Public Health Nurses will work across the current age boundaries and provide a single point of contact for families
• to create more opportunities for all children, young people and their familiies to access a Public Health Nurse
• to ensure consistent delivery of the healthy child programme into special schools
• to re establish the healthy schools programme
• to establish a healthy tots programme for early years settings
• to improve school readiness
• to improve oral health
• to lead and coordinate a network of breastfeeding peer support

What happens next

This consultation will run for 6 weeks.

After this time the results will be analysed and the new Healthy Child Programme model will be announced.

We will then advertise for a new provider to be appointed.

We anticipate that the new integrated Healthy Child Programme will be in place by July 2017.