{"id":143299,"date":"2018-06-19T13:31:33","date_gmt":"2018-06-19T13:31:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/english\/nhs-70-how-have-hospitals-changed-for-children\/"},"modified":"2018-06-19T13:31:33","modified_gmt":"2018-06-19T13:31:33","slug":"nhs-70-how-have-hospitals-changed-for-children","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/english\/nhs-70-how-have-hospitals-changed-for-children\/","title":{"rendered":"NHS 70: How have hospitals changed for children?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Ziggi
Image caption Ziggi Thompson is being treated for leukaemia <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Ward 84 at the Royal Manchester Children's Hospital looks after young patients with cancer and leukaemia.<\/p>\n

It's home from home for four-year-old Ziggi Thompson. She has leukaemia and is having intensive chemotherapy. <\/p>\n

Like most of the children here, she has lost her hair and is wheeling around a portable drip.<\/p>\n

She's also very excited.<\/p>\n

When Ziggi grows up, she wants to be a superhero.<\/p>\n

Batman, Superman, Spiderman and Black Widow are on the ward, giving the children high fives and "superhero fist-bumps".<\/p>\n

Image caption The superheroes give children on the ward a lift <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Andy, also known as Manchester's Dark Knight, says his group comes to make the children smile. He tells parents he's a crime fighter by profession, as he's a security officer at the Arndale Shopping Centre. <\/p>\n

The children are delighted, laughing and chatting to the heroes. They barely notice as nurses do observations and changes medications. <\/p>\n

This is the largest single-site children's hospital in the UK. And it has facilities for patients from birth to 18 years old. <\/p>\n

There are toys on the rooftop garden, colourful play-rooms and teen zones that look like student unions. <\/p>\n

Ziggi's favourite part of her ward is the school room.<\/p>\n

She was diagnosed four months ago. And initially spent five weeks in hospital. Now, she is here every other week.<\/p>\n

Image caption Emily Pedrazzini sleeps next to her daughter on the ward <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Her mum, Emily Pedrazzini, is by her side the whole time.<\/p>\n

Every night, she sleeps on a pull-out bed next to Ziggi's hospital bed. She stays with Ziggi. And her husband looks after their six-year-old son, Zach.<\/p>\n

She says she has to mentally prepare herself every time they come in - "knowing that I don't leave the room for a whole week, I don't get to see my son, I don't get to take him to school".<\/p>\n

But, she says, it's become part of her normal life now. "Everyone is in the same boat. The kids play. And you get into your daily routines," she says.<\/p>\n

Image caption A children's ward in 1948 <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This is a far cry from paediatrics in 1948. Back then, parents were allowed to visit children perhaps once a week. <\/p>\n

Andrea Merrall was Ziggi's age at the time. She had a long stay in hospital with tuberculosis. <\/p>\n

She says she used to scream and shout when her parents left. <\/p>\n

Eventually, she made such a fuss that her parents were banned from coming in at all. <\/p>\n

She remembers feeling "isolated". <\/p>\n

"I hated them leaving me," she says.<\/p>\n

"And I'm sure they must have hated leaving me too."<\/p>\n

Image caption Andrea as a young girl (left) with her family <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Stephanie Snow, a historian from the University of Manchester, is working on NHS at 70: The Story of Our Lives, a social history made up of memories from staff and patients. <\/p>\n

She says former child patients have told her about frightening ambulance trips to hospital without their parents.<\/p>\n

Others remember being treated on wards with adults, or being kept in quarantine if they had infectious diseases such as scarlet fever.<\/p>\n

Ms Snow says treatment was often painful too. Some patients were injected with penicillin straight into their muscles, possibly several times a day. <\/p>\n

Rights of the child<\/h2>\n

Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH) president Prof Russell Viner says: "Paediatrics was born in the NHS. And that's something worth celebrating.<\/p>\n

"From cancer survival rates and gene therapy to vaccine development, we've come a long way in the last 70 years, especially in terms of children's rights."<\/p>\n

But he is also calling for a "renewed focus on children".<\/p>\n

"We need to deliver healthcare for children and young people that's fit for a modern NHS," he says.<\/p>\n

"As the NHS turns 70, we have fresh opportunity to protect the health of future generations. So, let's prioritise child health and help make that happen."<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Image caption Ziggi Thompson is being treated for leukaemia Ward 84 at the Royal Manchester Children's Hospital looks after young patients with cancer and leukaemia. It's home from home for<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":143300,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-143299","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143299","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=143299"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143299\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/143300"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=143299"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=143299"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=143299"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}