Long delays in NHS care are causing serious damage to children’s health in the UK
Children in the UK are suffering serious health damage, including chronic pain, asthma attacks, weight loss and developmental problems, due to long waits for NHS care.
Some young people under the age of 18 find it so difficult to get prompt treatment for their diabetes or epilepsy that they are forced to go to the emergency room because their health has deteriorated so much.
Pediatricians called the findings “shocking” and warned that some children would suffer “lifelong consequences” from delays that could last for years.
The details emerged in a dossier of evidence gathered by the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH) which illustrates the harm caused by unavailability of treatments.
A paediatrician specialising in neurodevelopmental problems said children who joined the list had to wait six years for their first appointment because the service could not cope with demand. Another said the average wait for a first consultation was three years and five months.
The anxiety and challenges caused by the delays can be so difficult for children and families to cope with that some parents have even split up as a result of the pressure, having reached “breaking point”, the college said. In addition, some families are forced to pay for private care to avoid NHS waiting lists.
According to the RCPCH, a survey of 195 paediatricians in the four home countries has found that NHS officials need to invest more resources in caring for children under 18.
It also turned out that some children:
Significant weight gain due to the long time it takes to get an initial blood test for hypothyroidism and then consult a specialist in hormone-related disorders before treatment can begin.
For years they live in poverty because their family cannot claim disability benefits for children while they wait for a pediatrician to make a diagnosis.
They suffer enormous emotional damage from the fear of having to wait for appointments, tests and treatments, a period that feels like a large part of their lives.
Dr Ronny Cheung, the college’s health services officer, said: “My paediatric colleagues have provided a shocking snapshot of the current state of child healthcare. While these findings come as no surprise to me as a consultant paediatrician, they are nevertheless sobering to read.
“The consequences of long waiting times are as devastating as they are far-reaching: children and their families are denied child benefits until they have been seen by a paediatrician; mild symptoms developing into much more complicated conditions and reduced quality of life, exclusion from school and wider stress in the family.
“These are consequences that will have lifelong consequences and, tragically, will be repeated hundreds of thousands of times across the UK.”
Some children with spinal deformities develop heart and breathing problems because they have to wait so long for surgery, or because the surgery becomes too risky, Cheung adds.
He highlighted the delays young children with swallowing difficulties can face in seeking access to speech and language therapy to help them eat normally. Those wait times, and a lack of regular follow-up appointments because a service was busy, “can mean a child has to be fed enterally – through a feeding tube in their gut – rather than developing the swallowing skills needed to eat normally,” Cheung said.
The physical and mental effects of not receiving care for extended periods can also lead to children missing a lot of school or, in some cases, not being able to attend at all. That, in turn, can mean less time with friends, social isolation and anxiety, Cheung added.
He cited the case of a child whose community nurses referred them to paediatric services at the age of two because the baby had developmental delays, but the child was not seen until they started school three years later, at the age of five.
“As a result, the crucial window for developmental intervention was missed. Because there was a three-year delay in getting a diagnosis, which was a genetic condition, a younger sibling had since been born with the same condition, because opportunities for prenatal counseling were missed,” Cheung said.
A request has been submitted to the Department of Health and Social Care.