When your child starts school at the age of 5, their care is transferred from the health visiting service to the school nursing service.
We provide a health service to children and young people aged 5 to 19 years old across mainstream schools in Lambeth and Southwark, as well as children and young people educated other than at school (EOTAS).
We're a team of specialist public health nurses (known as school nurses), registered nurses, and public health assistants who are led by specialist school nurse team leaders. We also have universal school administrators who support the administration function of the team. Find out more on our team page.
We're available Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm including during the school holidays (except bank holidays).
The service is confidential. If we receive information that needs to be shared with other professionals we'll try to first discuss with you the reason for this and how the information will be shared.
For children attending complex needs schools like Tuke or Cherry Gardens (Southwark) and The Livity School and Heron Academy (Lambeth) visit our complex needs school nursing page for information.
We accept referrals. Find out about referring to our service.
What we offer
Advice and support
We provide a text messaging advice line for parents and a text messaging advice line for young people aged 11 to 19.
We offer advice and support about a range of topics, including:
- healthy lifestyles
- dental health
- managing chronic (long-term) health conditions
- emotional health, such as anxiety or changes in behaviour
- sleep
- relationships
- puberty
- sexual health
- risk-taking behaviours, such as drugs and alcohol
We also support families and multi-agency teams to address children's unmet health needs.
Working with other services
We'll tell you about other services who may be able to help you and refer you to them, including:
We also work alongside multi-agency teams to support children with additional needs or children who might be at risk of harm.
Working with schools
We work closely with schools to deliver a range of services, including:
- The National Child Measurement Programme (NCMP)
- The Lancaster Model, a health questionnaire for parents, carers and pupils
- confidential drop-in clinics in secondary schools
- assessing the health needs of individual children
- relationship and sexual health sessions in schools
- chronic health awareness sessions for staff working in schools