For children and young people with epilepsy, parents and carers need to provide the educational setting with a letter or epilepsy passport from the paediatrician confirming the diagnosis. This should include information on triggers and seizure types, prescribed anti-epileptic drugs and guidance for administration of emergency medication.
This information can be transcribed into a Health Care Plan, which the Epilepsy Specialist Nurse or Hammersmith and Fulham School Health Team can assist with, if the child or young person is attending a school or other educational setting. The Epilepsy Specialist Nurse can complete a Health Care Plan for children and young people not attending school if required.
Hammersmith and Fulham School Health Team also offer yearly epilepsy awareness sessions to all local state funded schools in the area.
If the child or young person attends a special school, training will be provided for all relevant staff on site, by the Special School Nurse or by the Hammersmith and Fulham School Health Team as appropriate.
For children requiring emergency rescue medication such as Buccal Midazolam the School Nurse can arrange training. All identified staff supporting the children and young people in school should undertake general 'Epilepsy awareness' and 'Emergency management of a seizure' training. Online training for education settings can be accessed through these links:
School seizure guide on youngepilepsy.org.uk
Epilepsy training on www.epilepsy.org.uk
Supporting young people with epilepsy on Young Epilepsy
For further advice and guidance please contact the Hammersmith and Fulham School Health Team in the first instance.
The Specialist Epilepsy Nurse can also oversee the support for CYP and their networks, by supporting the community paediatricians during diagnosis and investigations, management and care planning, review and transition.
Contact details
- Chelsea & Westminster Epilepsy Clinical Nurse Specialist: Tracey Oakden
Telephone: 020 3315 8000 / 020 3315 3197 / 020 3315 3326
Email: tracy.oakden3@nhs.net - St Mary's Hospital Clinical Nurse Specialist: Christina Korley
Telephone: 020 8312 6914
Email: c.korley@nhs.net