The health experiences of children and young people in care in England

Having grown up in care myself, I am interested in improving health outcomes for other children in care. When children and young people enter the care system, the law requires that they undergo an initial health assessment... [ view full abstract ]

Having grown up in care myself, I am interested in improving health outcomes for other children in care. When children and young people enter the care system, the law requires that they undergo an initial health assessment within twenty working days. Thereafter, children aged nought to five are required to have bi-annual review health assessments that incorporate a developmental element, and children and young people aged five and over are required to have annual review health assessments. These health assessments are used to identify health problems and if necessary, to develop health care plans. Foster carers and other professionals can then use these health care plans to monitor and manage health conditions appropriately. Yet, despite the implementation of these specialist services many children and young people fail to engage appropriately with the healthcare system and go on to experience deteriorating health during their transition to independence.

I will present a new study that is exploring the physical and mental health experiences of children and young people in care in England. My study adopts visual and creative research methods to elicit the health beliefs of young people aged eleven to eighteen to explore how their beliefs relate to their engagement with health services. I will discuss this in relation to their experiences of health services, which includes their experiences of statutory health assessments. Specifically, five young people from each region of England are being given digital cameras to enable them to capture what they believe it means to be healthy or unhealthy, and are also asked to complete food and sleep diaries. They are then invited to an interview where they each collage a life size human body to represent their health and health experiences while talking about their health experiences. Young people are also displaying one key message on their collage that they think professionals need to hear in order to improve services. Preliminary analysis will be available by the end of August 2016 and key themes will be presented. My unique, user-led research aims to represent the voices of children and young people in care in England.