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Paediatrician Questions NHS 111
A leading health child specialist has questioned whether England’s NHS 111 helpline is safe and effective for young children.
16:35 22 February 2016
Professor Neena Modi, the president of Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health said that NHS 111 helpline was not effective as call handlers are not medically trained.
She said: It is uncertain - because studies have not been adequately conducted - whether or not the telephone triage service, such as NHS 111, is really going to be safe and effective for very small children.
"Even a clinician trying to make an assessment over the telephone would find it much more difficult in a smaller child than in an older child.
"Then when you add in the lack of clinical expertise, it's going to be even more difficult.
"I feel really sorry for the call handlers because they are being placed in a position that really it's questionable that they should be placed in."
A report release last month by NHS England covered the case of 12-month-old William Mead, from Cornwall, who died in 2014 after staff failed to recognised the seriousness of his condition.
His mother, Melissa, agreed to Prof Modi’s comments and said: "I found the out-of-hours system that I used with William on the Saturday (the day before he died) to be chaotic.