At Home

There is a huge gap in support for children with serious and complex conditions.

The Royal College of Nursing reports that nearly half of Child Community Nursing teams have had to refuse referrals due to capacity. Depending on the area, there are between 10-20% of children unable to leave hospital, causing upwards of £800,000 and 900 bed nights wasted per hospital per year.

 The quality of life and care at home are much higher for a child, along with the reduced emotional and mental distress being isolated on a ward creates.

This statistic underscores the lack of essential services for sick children in the vast majority of local communities.

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Why do we need the At Home Service

Improving the care of seriously ill children is the core of our At Home Service.

By enabling a child to leave hospital, especially when they would not of been able to without our support, means that child is in a much better environment to recover.

This also has knock on effects throughout the hospital and community:

  • Increase in the number of critical care beds. enabling children who desperately need the care can get it, reducing waiting lists and increasing chances of recover for the child.
  • More beds in A&E or local hospitals are freed as the child can get a bed in the critical care ward they need to be in but couldn't. This means waiting times ain A&E and local hospitals is reduced and levels of care increase across the community
  • Ambulance waiting times reduced. When there are no beds in A&E or local wards the Ambulance team need to wait with the patient until a bed is found.
  • Reduced waiting times and improved care for children with serious conditions that need to be re-admitted to critical care wards.
We have created the At Home service to help children return home and then support them  once they have left hospital. We provide an experienced Community Care Co-ordinator for a local area.

Some of the things we do that make a difference, especially for those who are disadvantaged and poor as well as ill:

  • We provide economic and safe pain-relieving equipment approved but not provided by the NHS.
  • We provide games equipment and if needed, the Wifi to run them
  • We provide tablets to support home/school communications for interactive education /creative play.
  • We provide support and information around transition from hospital; to home and vice versa.
  • We are setting up a monitored online hub for kids and parents to connect with others and feel they are not alone. The kids hub will include games and educational tools etc as well as being able to play them with other kids, including those in a similar situation.
  • We help children feel more cared for and less lonely and scared, helping maintain friendships and develop new ones.
  • We help parents feel supported and help them to support their child, providing advocacy & financial advice to reduce helplessness and worry. We provide professional liaison with medical/hospital staff.
  • We work with partners to provide therapeutic approaches and trauma based interventions.
  • We provide sensory equipment and stress relieving toys and “tangles” - little things to make you feel special & thought about.
  • We fund what statutory authorities can’t or won’t provide; we don’t duplicate. We complement other agencies and don’t compete. Too much to do!
  • We work around nutrition and taste of food and getting the basics in – sleep and nutrition and love promote healing and reduce stress for everyone.
  • We organise and pay for child-friendly bed or care room decoration, to provide a child sensitive environment, where parents can’t afford to do so.
The Process for Samuel's Charity's At Home Service

How you can help

If you want to get involved with our At Home Service then there are a number of ways to do this.

  1. Donate - a one off or a recurring donation. This directly funds our Care Co-Ordinators and the equipment and support the child and family gets
  2. Become a Partner. Many businesses have services or skills that would help the At Home Service.
  3. Networking - Businesses are a key part of tour community and networking helps us buold connections in the community and helps the individual company too.
  4. Join our Events to fundraise. The Get Involved page, https://www.samuelscharity.org.uk/home/get-involved/ - has the details of all our upcoming events from Annual Dinners, walks in the countryside, Runs, Marathons, Ironmans, Tough Mudders and more! You can set up your own if none of these work for you.