CHF has taken part in this week’s Paediatric Critical Care and Paediatric Specialised Surgery Third Sector and Patient/ Parent Groups Webinar.

The webinar on 05 January 2017 was a platform to update participants on early thinking for the Paediatric Critical Care and Paediatric Specialised Surgery Service Review.

The Chair was Dr Peter Wilson, Clinical Lead, Women and Children’s National Programme of Care Co-Chair, NHS England and key points from the webinar addressed:

• The importance of interdependency and sustainability over the next 5 years with regard to paediatric critical care and paediatric specialised surgery, as well as specialist transport;

• The webinar did not address the congenital cardiac review nor winter pressure planning but a point was made at the end of the webinar that further face-to-face meetings may be scheduled where colleagues representing the CHD community will be invited;

• Only 25% of units meet 1:1 nursing ratio which is not sustainable;

• There are variations in service provision from one centre to another impacting on how children are operated on and how they are transported between one centre and another;

• Children are being moved from district to general hospitals due to the retirement of consultants who are not being replaced;

• Need to ensure that the interdependent needs of complex children are met;

• There is a requirement to create capacity in the system;

• Also, a need to treat children closer to home;

• Value for money is necessary;

• Currently there is a request to ensure there is more family involvement and engagement with analytical work to be addressed so that work streams can be decided upon with a working plan by the end of summer 2017;

• This current engagement process is a starter to ensure that the aims of the review are going in the right direction.

The four work streams will look at: models of care; demand; demand capacity; and workforce.

More opportunities for engagement will follow and NHS England is also inviting comments to the england.paedsreview@nhs.net inbox to encourage dialogue for those that cannot attend forthcoming webinars and would like to engage with the Review Team.