A patient’s journey to the children’s hospital
Research type
Research Study
Full title
A patient’s journey to the children’s hospital – a mixed methods approach to understanding how children come to be admitted to hospital
IRAS ID
167088
Contact name
S Turner
Contact email
Clinicaltrials.gov Identifier
, 14/NS/1071
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 5 months, 1 days
Research summary
The characteristics of children referred to hospital appear to be changing. In one audit of admissions over nine years under the care of one consultant at Aberdeen Royal Children’s Hospital found a falling average age of children being admitted and a rising proportion of admissions where children were simply observed and discharged within 24 hours of admission. This study will take a mixed methods approach to address the questions “Are characteristics of paediatric admissions to hospital changing? And, assuming that they are, why?”
In the quantitative part of this study, routinely acquired hospital admission statistics will be used to describe changes in admission characteristics from data held by NHS Grampian, NHS Tayside and Hospital Episode Statistics (England and Wales).
In the qualitative part of this study, interviews will be held with referring clinicians (n=10), receiving clinicians (n=10) and parents of children admitted to hospital (n=10). These interviews will include referring and receiving clinicians and the parents involved in 5 paediatric admissions.
This study will provide a timely and novel insight into the present drivers for admitting children to hospital in the ever-dynamic NHS.
REC name
North of Scotland Research Ethics Committee 1
REC reference
14/NS/1071
Date of REC Opinion
25 Nov 2014
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion