Your NHS: Home visits saving children from hospital visits

An NHS trust says a home visit service to young patients has saved thousands of children from needing to visit hospital.

Services based out of both Portsmouth and Southampton are available to patients under 16 who have been referred by a local GP.

The teams focus on treating respiratory illness including bronchiolitis, asthma, chest infections and viral wheezing as well as gastroenteritis and tonsillitis.

Hampshire and Isle of Wight Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust also hopes that it will enable hospitals to discharge patients earlier.

The Portsmouth Children's Outreach Assessment and Support Team (COAST) is available to patients in Portsmouth, Fareham, Gosport and South East Hampshire.

The Southampton Children's Hospital @Home Team (CH@H) cares for patients in Southampton City and South West Hampshire excluding Avon Valley, Eastleigh and Chandlers Ford.

Since the services started in 2022 they have supported 7124 children. 87% of those were under 5 years old and more than 91% did not need hospital treatment.

Chris Dowdell, senior community children's nurse and member for the COAST team said "Our main aim is to keep children at home as much as possible and support families and give them the advice and support they need to manage their child's illness."

"At this time of year hospitals aren't the ideal place for families, parents and careers are very anxious about taking their children to hospital so if we can support them in their own home it's so much better for them."

"A lot of our feedback suggests that if we weren't here then they would go back either to the GP or the hospital."

"We see a range of illnesses. During the winter months particularly respiratory virus are very prominent."

"Bronchiolitis, viral wheeze, asthma and we're very much a short term service in terms we see these children and just keep monitoring them over a few days to make sure that they are improving and things aren't going so well then we can make sure they get that ongoing care they need."

Shanice Beale called the service when her 12 week old baby Myles was unwell with a cough: "It's great to have, it's really reassuring."

"It's great because I can just call them if I'm concerned and they'll be here soon as they can."

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