Emergency procedures in children and young people

This study has been commissioned by Healthcare Quality Improvement Partnership
as part of the Child Health Clinical Outcome Review Programme as part of the current contract awarded in 2019.
For information on how we use data click here

Data collection for study:                   To commence June 2024
Patient identification spreadsheet data collection:     Open
Clinical data collection:                    Open
Organisational data collection:                Open
Publication date:                        Late 2025  

Aim
To identify good practice and remediable factors in the delivery of care provided to children and young people (CYP) (0-18th birthday) undergoing emergency (non-elective) procedures under anaesthetic or sedation.
Participation
All hospital providers where patients might undergo emergency (non-elective) procedures will be asked to participate in the study. Data collection The two time frames from which data will be sampled will be:

• Time frame 1: Monday 17th June 00:00 – Sunday 30th June 23:59 2024
• Time frame 2: Monday 12th February 00:00 – Sunday 25th February 23:59 2024

Patient identification spreadsheets
Two patient identification spreadsheets will be used to identify patients for inclusion retrospectively in the study – one to be completed for time frame 1 and one to be completed for time frame 2.
Clinician questionnaires
Three questionnaires will be used to collect clinical data for this study:

• Surgical (operator) questionnaire
• Anaesthetic questionnaire
• Transfer questionnaire (where applicable)

Up to 20 patients per hospital will be sampled for inclusion and these will be split across the two data sampling time frames (i.e. 10 from time frame 1 and 10 from time frame 2).
On the day survey
This is being used to collect information around potential delays to surgery that might not necessarily be available later in the case notes.

• This survey will not be linked to quality accounts.
• The survey should be completed as close to the time of the procedure as possible, but it does not have to be completed during/immediately following surgery.
• We recognise that a survey will not be completed for every patient – the survey can be completed for as few or as many children and young people over the study period as the clinicians have capacity to do.
• The survey can be completed by any member of the theatre team providing care to the patient – more than one member of the team can complete a survey on the same patient if they want to.
• The patient identification spreadsheets will still be the main source for identifying patients for inclusion in the study.

Case note extracts for review
Case notes will be requested for all patients included in the peer review aspect of the study.
Organisational questionnaires
An organisational questionnaire will be sent to all hospitals where patients might undergo emergency (non-elective) procedures, and to hospitals where patients may present, prior to transfer for surgery.

Please see the study protocol for more detailed information on the study methods.
Any other queries relating to this study should also be addressed to eps@ncepod.org.uk