Children's virtual ward

The Children’s Virtual Ward is a special service designed to take care of your child’s health from the comfort of your home.

What to expect

Receiving monitoring equipment

Your child will receive important equipment from your GP surgery to help monitor their health.
This equipment is simple to use and helps us keep an eye on how your child is doing.

Login details

You’ll get a text message with your login details to access the monitoring platform.
Keep this information safe - you will need it to stay connected.

Support team contact

Within 2 hours of receiving the equipment, the Support Team at DOCCLA (the people who supply the equipment) will call you.
They’ll show you how to set it up and answer any questions.

Actions to take

If your child:

is too breathless to talk, eat or drink
pauses in breathing, has irregular breathing or is grunting
is choking
is very sleepy or unable to wake
is limp and floppy
has blue, grey, pale blotchy skin
has sudden confusion
has a severe injury or heavy bleeding
is having a seizure

Go to the Urgent and Emergency Care Centre (UECC) (formerly A&E) or call 999.

If your child:

has slightly fast breathing
is sucking in around their ribcage or underneath their ribs
is getting worse or you are worried
sounds more wheezy with their breathing
is not taking half of what they would normally eat or drink
is not regularly passing urine
is not playing like they normally would
has increasing pain

Call the Children’s Virtual Ward team any day between 8am and 8pm. Contact 111 if it is outside of these times.

Being discharged from the virtual ward

Good signs that your child is improving and you are likely to be discharged from virtual ward is when they are:

breathing as normal
taking more than half of their normal feeds or drinks
passing urine (weeing) regularly
playing and behaving more like normal

How do I contact the children's virtual ward?

Our team will contact you between 8am and 8pm to monitor your child’s condition. Your child will remain under our care for 48 hours, during which you will also have access to the Children’s Assessment Unit.

Our goal is to help reduce the need for hospital admissions and shorten hospital stays.

We’re available 7 days a week, 365 days a year.

Contact information

To contact the Children’s Virtual Ward team, call:

Care Coordination Centre

Telephone: 01709 426600
Available 8am to 8pm

A member of the Virtual Ward team will return your call as soon as possible.

Children’s Assessment Unit at Rotherham Hospital

Telephone: 01709 424053
Available 8pm to 8am

We’re here to provide the best care and support for your child.

If you have any concerns about your child before we contact you, seek medical advice through the South Yorkshire and Bassetlaw Healthier Together website.

Why have we been referred to the virtual ward?

Your child has been assessed by your GP, and it was decided that ongoing monitoring and support from our children's virtual ward team may be beneficial.

Can we decline to be under the children’s virtual ward?

Yes. You do not have to be referred to the virtual ward. You will be asked for consent before a referral. The virtual ward is just one of the options available to you.

Who will look after my child?

We are a team of dedicated and experienced paediatric (children's) nurses, here to support unwell children in the comfort of their home.

Are the paediatric (children's) team at the hospital involved?

Yes, following your child’s initial assessment on virtual ward your child will be overseen by the paediatric (children's) doctors on the Children’s Assessment Unit (CAU) and you will have open access to the ward.

How will we be seen?

We can offer assessments by telephone, video or home visits, creating a personalised care plan for your child, using DOCCLA equipment for better monitoring and care. We can also work with with paediatric (children's) doctors on the Children's Assessment Unit if a hospital assessment is needed.

Do I need to have internet access to use the equipment?

No. The equipment can work using Wi-Fi, but it also has its own SIM card so you do not need to have your own Wi-Fi for it to work.

Survey

Your feedback matters. We want to hear from you. Your feedback helps us make the children’s virtual ward better.

When your child joins the virtual ward, you’ll receive a text with a link to a short survey. Completing the survey is quick and easy.