To ask the Minister of Health whether his Department will fund the aftercare following paediatric percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy surgery.

Patient who have a paediatric percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy surgery in RBHSC have access to theatre capacity, inpatient bed capacity (children stay between 48-72 hours), parental training to manage the peg tube, equipment and food, and follow up appointments to manage the children’s follow up care. This is required to ensure continuity of care for the children and their parents. However, there are only a small number of specialist nurses in RBHSC who provide this care and as such this can be a limiting factor when there is a backlog of patients receiving treatment.

Officials have asked Belfast Health and Social Services Trust staff to consider options for addressing the current backlog of children waiting for paediatric percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy surgery. Once this is provided my officials from the Strategic Planning and Performance Group (SPPG) will consider this plan as a matter of urgency.

Wider discussions are also underway to consider the additional recurrent need for children’s services including the need for pre-assessment clinics for these complex children and other complex cases, the need for additional specialist nursing capacity in RBHSC and for the expansion of nursing roles in local hospital paediatric units.

However, this will be challenging within the current nursing and financial constraints.