CHF SAYS CHARITIES MUST WORK TOGETHER IN NEW NHS REVIEW TO GET THE BEST CARE FOR ALL HEART CHILDREN
The Children’s Heart Federation is calling on all heart charities to work together in NHS England’s new review of congenital heart disease services.
The UK’s leading children’s heart charity, which represents a growing network of heart organisations across the UK, is calling on all national and local charities to unite behind the aim of pushing for the best possible standards of care for all children across the country born with heart conditions.
Following on from the recent Safe and Sustainable Review into children’s cardiac services, Secretary of State, Jeremy Hunt has given NHS England the responsibility for taking forward the process. A new review is now underway to consider the whole lifetime pathway of care for people with congenital heart disease (CHD) which will include adult services.
In a letter to CHF in July, Jeremy Hunt praised the “amount of work and dedication” that CHF brought to the previous Safe and Sustainable Review and said “the vast amount of engagement, modelling and analysis that has already been done will be invaluable for the next phase of this work”.
Amongst many issues, the new review will re-visit the configuration of cardiac surgical services. CHF will not be making representation to NHS England about which units should be delivering surgical services and will continue to campaign for the highest standards in every unit that performs heart operations for children.
Anne Keatley-Clarke, Chief Executive of CHF says: “CHF welcome NHS England’s recent meetings to hear from national and local charities and supports the right of all charities to have a fair chance to represent their views.
“In the new review, CHF will continue to represent its wide network of member groups, many of whom represent a particular children’s heart unit or focus on a specific heart condition.
“We recognise that some local charities will naturally want to campaign for their local units, but we hope that we can all unite behind the common goal of ensuring that all children, in every part of the country has access to excellent treatment, including surgery, and ongoing care to give them the best possible health outcomes”.
To find out more about the New Congenital Heart Disease Review, please visit NHS England’s blog by John Holden at www.england.nhs.uk/category/publications/blogs/john-holden/
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Notes:
- The Children’s Heart Federation (CHF) is the UK’s leading children’s heart charity. It has a uniquely broad perspective on children’s and young people’s heart services because within its member network there are member groups with strong links to a particular hospital and able to provide a regional view whilst others are able to share their expertise of particular conditions.
- CHF supports families through its information service, small grants programme, peer support events and provision of equipment. The charity also lobbies for changes to the health, social care and education systems for the benefit of heart families (see www.chfed.org.uk).
