Category Archives: Health of East Lothian

Early Year & Physical Activity

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A new resource just came out from the British Heart Foundation.  The document has lots of web links to useful resources and programme materials that can be downloaded.

It can be downloaded directly from the site, or it can be ordered in hard copy (for a small donation) from the BHF site as below.

 http://www.bhf.org.uk/publications/view-publication.aspx?ps=1002163

The guide is for:

 Early years settings who provide care to children from birth up to the age of five. It can be used by all regulated providers, irrespective of the time that children spend in their care, including:

– local authority maintained nursery schools

– private, voluntary and independent nurseries

– nursery classes within primary schools

– pre-schools

– children’s centres

– registered childminders and nannies

– other early years providers such as playgroups and baby and toddler groups.

 

PEEP

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The Parent Early Education Partnership was started in 1995 and  has developed a five-year programme offering developmentally appropriate support for parents and carers.  It covers the period from their child’s birth to starting school. Already well established in Midlothian this programme is relatively new to East Lothian, and Support from the Start has sponsored training for around 30 practitioners to bring this programme to more parents and children in East Lothian. The cluster champions groups that have got going so far have all identified PEEP as one of the resources they would like to bring into there communities.

 PEEP Programme Aims

  1. To promote parents’ and carers’ awareness of children’s very early learning and development through making the most of everyday activities and interactions.
  2. To support parents/carers in their relationships with their children, so that the children’s self-esteem will be enhanced.
  3. To affirm the crucial role of parents/carers as children’s first educators.
  4. To support parents/carers in the development of their children’s literacy and numeracy.
  5. To support parents/carers so that they can encourage the development of positive learning dispositions.
  6. To promote and support parents’ and carers’ lifelong learning.

Maureen Black family, engagement worker, has been runnig a PEEP group for babies and their parents in partnership with the Musselburgh Burgh Primary school using the schools community room. The sessions are very popular with parents as this recent feedback suggests

We’re really enjoying these Wednesday afternoons with you. The sessions are really relaxed and fun for the wee ones (and us big uns) and you are so welcoming. 

For more information on PEEP and the evidence base for the programme visit  www.peep.org.uk

 

 

Plain packs campaign from ASH Scotland

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Should we be allowing the tobacco industry to be promoting cigarette smoking with attractive packaging. The product  is damaging to health and highly addictive. 

The tobaco industry invests a lot of money in packaging and promotion of cigarettes, and there is little doubt that children can be attracted to it. 

If you think packaging for cigarettes should be plain  you can support ASH Scotland’s campaign at link below.

Help protect children – join our plain packs campaign

 

Food & health for the under 5′s training

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NHS Lothian / East Lothian Council are jointly offering a training course on Food and Health for the under 5’s on 12th June 9am – 1pm at Port Seaton Community Centre Closing date for applications – 25th May

To book www.nhslothianhpstraining.com

Learning Outcomes

Participants will have the opportunity to:

  • Gain an overview of the policy context relating to early years nutrition
  •  Develop an understanding of the current eating patterns of the under 5’s in Scotland and the impact on future health
  •  Explore some of the challenges faced by parents and carers when making healthy food choices for the under 5’s
  •  Increase awareness of what constitutes a healthy balanced diet for the under 5’s

 For more information poster linked here flyer-Healthy Eating under ’5s May 2012

Booking early!

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The NHS has a new target to get pregnant women to book early for antenatal care – it is now one of the NHS Scotland performance measures, which means that NHS managers have to report to government on how well this is being achieved.

At least 80% of pregnant women in each SIMD quintile will have booked for antenatal care by the 12th week of gestation by March 2015 so as to ensure improvements in breast feeding rates and other important health behaviours

The hope is that if women can be persuaded to book as early as possible in their pregnancy then there is more likelihood that they will get the support and advice they need in the period of foetal development that is the most sensitive. However this is not something that can be done by maternity services alone as was pointed out in the refreshed Framework for Maternity Servces last year

We know that improving access to antenatal care is insufficient; it needs to be accompanied by a focus on continuous, effective,  assessment of health and social need in order to identify any prevention and early intervention actions needed before babies are born and in the early days of their lives. We know that to do this effectively, maternity care staff need to work in partnership with each other and with women and their families, using health asset or strengths based approaches

Women, their partners and families need to be able to access a range of support and advice, not just medical information, but also information on child development, nutrition, as well as social and psychological support where needed. The NhS is often known as the cradle to grave service – but in reality it is the conception to grave service – and for future health outcomes those first few months post conception are a key time for services to support both parents and the future child.

 

Suffering in Silence

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 Some of the parents who spoke about the ‘things that mattered to them’ at the Healthy Happy Bairn’s conference outlined the impact depression following birth can have on women and their families. So a new report on the impact of postnatal depression with case studies and practical suggestions as to how families can be helped through better and more aware services is timely.

In Britain today, we are letting families down by not preparing them for the possibility of postnatal depression and not acting quickly or appropriately when it occurs – as a result we are stacking up problems for the future and causing needless misery for thousands. We believe that the recommendations in this report have the potential to give new strength to families at a crucial stage in their lives with long term, positive consequences. Failure to deliver this change means more unnecessary suffering and the spiralling costs of the consequences. We cannot afford to do nothing.

Suffering-in-Silence

Changing the odds

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Cancer is something that will touch most people’s  lives – either directly or through somone we know and care for. Less than half of all the cancers suffered by people in the UK are caused by factors that we can have some influence over – so as individuals we can’t avoid all the risk by following healthy living advice. You can do  everything right and still be unlucky enough to develop a cancer. By following the healthy living advice you are just changing the odds in your favour. By the same logic ignoring the healthy living advice  – to maintain a healthy weight, eat plenty of fruit and veg, not to drink to excess, get plenty of moderate exercise and above all not to smoke -  doesn’t mean you will definitely develop illnesses like cancer – you are simply changing the odds .

The key thing for this blog is that many of the lifestyle factors are set in early life, and as parents, teachers, community members we can have a big influence on whether children will grow up to avoid these risks.

We can also organise society to reduce the risk of cancer. For example, by making it easier for people to access fruit and veg, take exercise, avoid cigarette smoke and access to help to give up. We can also make sure that workplaces are safe and do expose workers to occupational hazards – we can make alcohol more expensive so that we don’t drink quite as much etc etc. None of that is easy but nor is developing and organising treatment for cancer and least of all undergoing treatment for cancer

Cancer risk

Cancer risk