Safeguarding Children

“Chelsea and Westminster Hospital is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children by putting the needs and views of children, young people and their families at the heart of the services we provide and our future plans,” says Andrew MacCallum, Director of Nursing and Board Director with responsibility for safeguarding children.

The Trust works with other organisations to ensure that children are safeguarded. We work in partnership with local Children's Trusts and local Safeguarding Children's Boards.

The Trust has a doctor, nurse, midwive and health visitor, who have specific responsibilities to ensure that children are safeguarded and do not come to harm. We safeguard children by ensuring we have the necessary policies and procedures in place and that staff are trained to follow these.

These policies and procedures include the follow-up of children who miss outpatient appointments and the identification of children who are patients in the hospital and who are subject to a child protection plan.

Importantly, the Trust has procedures to ensure that all staff undergo the relevant checks with the Criminal Records Bureau.

The Trust has a training programme to ensure that all staff are aware of their responsibilities to safeguard children. In November 2009 all staff received a Safeguarding Children training leaflet attached to their payslip.

As of December 2009, 65% of all Trust staff had undertaken face-to-face Level 1 safeguarding training (comprising 86% of staff who regularly work with children).

The Trust has plans in place to increase the uptake of Level 1 training to ensure all staff have received training. 100% of staff working regularly with children will have undertaken this training by the end of January 2010.