Providing clear and accurate information to your child’s service is essential to ensure your child is kept healthy and safe in their education and care service. The following points will help you to work effectively with the service to support your child’s health care:
It’s important that you do not feel intimidated or unsure about sharing information about your child’s health requirements with the service as they need this to help keep your child safe. The information you provide about your child is kept confidential and will only be shared with the staff who need it to support your child’s health, safety and wellbeing.
Services have a duty of care for each child and must make sure they protect their health and safety at all times. This means they have a responsibility to support your child in every way to ensure they receive a high standard of care. Some of the ways that your child’s service can do this include:
Services may also have access to updated information about your child’s type of health needs. If you have trouble finding information you can ask your service for any help they can provide.
While your service should aim to meet the needs of all of the children in their care, some negotiation and compromise may be required to ensure that the strategies support and protect your child while being practical for the child care setting. If your child has specific allergies, the service will work in partnership with you and other families using the service to ensure that your child is not exposed to the allergen."
While every reasonable attempt will be made, it may not be possible to make sure the allergen is entirely eliminated, for instance, if families provide children’s food. The service will need to develop clear procedures and guidelines for staff to prevent your child being exposed to the foods they are allergic to.
To be sure your child’s needs are met, keep an open and honest relationship with your education and care service, including the particular staff who work with your child.