Innovative help for children with allergies

Great news for children with allergies

Two innovative projects helping children with allergies are underway at Evelina London Children’s Hospital thanks to the support of the charity Action Against Allergy.

A new psychology service, thought to be the first of its kind in the UK, has launched at Evelina London to help patients and families deal with the psychological impact of allergies.

Our allergy team sees around 5,000 children and their families each year. A dedicated clinical psychologist in children’s allergy has joined the team to identify how children and their families can be supported to deal with a potentially long-term condition.

Roisin Fitzsimons, nurse consultant and joint clinical lead for the allergy team, says: “We’re very excited to offer a specialist psychology service as part of our children’s allergy service. I know this will make a very real difference to the lives of our patients and their families. We’re hugely grateful to the support of Action Against Allergy for making this innovative project possible.”

Action Against Allergy is also supporting the eczema education programme at Evelina London, a pioneering approach to children’s allergy care that begun in 2008 and was developed by Karina Jackson, consultant nurse at St John’s Institute of Dermatology.

The eczema education programme provides parents with practical information and advice on how to manage their children’s conditions at home. Evaluation has shown that parents are very pleased with the service and feel they have gained confidence in managing their child’s condition and needing fewer visits to the GP.

Patricia Schooling, executive director of Action Against Allergy, says: “As a patient support charity, the improvement of children’s allergy care has always been a major concern and we are confident that these two projects show the way forward. We are delighted to support them and hope they will lead to similar schemes being replicated more widely in the future.”