Children and Young People's Continuing Care (incorporating Adult Continuing Healthcare)

The Children and Young People's Continuing Care service follow the National Framework for Children and Young People's Continuing Care (2016). The Framework provides guidance to nurse assessors to determine if a child or young person's complex health needs require support, in addition to that provided by universal e.g.. Community Children's Nurse, School Nurse, Diabete's Nurse, or specialist services e.g. CAMHS. Our service receives referrals for children and young people who have complex physical, learning disability, mental health needs and also end of life care.

The National Framework relates to a child/young person from birth up until their 18th birthday. For adults (aged 18 years and over) a different framework is applied (National Framework for NHS Continuing Healthcare and NHS-funded Nursing Care. A member of the adult Continuing Healthcare (CHC) team will be happy to provide guidance with regards to adults over the age of 18, or either service for young person's going through the transition period to adulthood. 

The children's Continuing Care team and adult CHC team will work closely together throughout the transition period, along with the young person, parents/carers and all professionals involved.

A multi-professional meeting is initially needed to decide if continuing care is required (including: the health assessor, a social worker, and an education representative).  Parents/carers will need to be integral to this meeting along with the child or young person who has complex health needs,(if possible). The parents/carers will need to be fully aware of what Continuiing Care is and what the process entails.

The most appropriate health professional (health assessor) will take the lead in completing an application form, alongside other professionals and parents/carers who will support the completion, in providing supporting information.  As a service we will help parents/carers and relevant professionals to understand the process of the application for Continuing Care.

The health professional involved normally requests that a continuing care assessment  is considered, and should be discussed and decided within the multi-professional meeting. For an indication of whether a full application (Decision Support Tool) needs completing, members of the team around the child can consider completing a pre-assessment checklist, which is attached.

Staffordshire NHS Continuing Care is able to fund (commission) NHS and independant providers in order for them to provide healthcare in a variety of settings, for a child or young person; and ensure that the healthcare provided is carried out appropriately. The care provided is often described as a package of healthcare, which provides trained and competent carers in a wide variety of settings, to support a child or young person with complex healthcare needs. The leaflet attached provides information on Continuing Care.

The Department of Health revised the National Framework for Children and Young People's Continuing Care at the beginning of 2016, which is also attached.

Parents/carers, professionals and other person's wishing to have more information can freely contact the service for more advice and guidance on Continuing Care. The contact details for children and young person's Continuing care and adult CHC is included.