School nursing

School nursing is a universal service for children aged 5 to 19 years and their families.

School nursing is an essential area of Public Health

Good health and wellbeing in childhood is crucial for laying positive foundations for a child’s future.

School nurses play a vital role in promoting health and wellbeing across school communities.

They support whole-school approaches to healthy nutrition, physical activity, and emotional wellbeing (to name a few examples), while also working with individual children and young people facing physical or mental health challenges.

The time between a child’s fifth and 19th birthday also presents a time of significant change.

The move into adolescence involves rapid brain maturation, emotional growth and identity formation, all of which can influence behaviours associated with emotional sensitivity, risk-taking, impulse control and decision making.

School nurses are therefore well-placed to provide age-appropriate interventions that support behaviour change, emotional regulation and healthy decision making.

Public Health has a duty to provide public health services for children and young people aged 0 to 19, including key elements of school nursing services like the National Child Measurement Programme.

What we do in Havering

Public Health are responsible for the commissioning and contract management of the school nursing service, working collaboratively with the service provider, North East London Foundation Trust (NELFT) and wider partners to support service development and improvements.

NELFT also works with local professionals and agencies to support children and families in Havering and responds to local need and priorities.

The service also offers support to children and families who are not educated in school settings (including those that are home educated).

Find out more about the NELFT offer

School nurses deliver the nationally mandated National Child Measurement Programme, which offers children in reception (aged 4 to 5 years) and year 6 (aged 10 to 11 years) the opportunity to have their height and weight measured, with appropriate advice and onward referral for those children identified as under or overweight.

Havering’s health school nursing service is integrated with the local health visiting service, to ensure effective transition between services once children reach the age of five.

The school nursing visiting service plays an important role in the delivery of Havering's Happy Healthy Lives Plan (2024-27) ambition of enabling our children and families to lead happy, healthy lives, as well as the local implementation of the Government’s new Families First Partnership programme.

How you can make a change

• Contact the health visiting service through the NELFT 0 to 19 single point of contact in the event of any health and wellbeing concerns: Call: 0300 300 1635 (Monday - Friday 9am - 5pm); Email: Email: havering0-19SPA@nelft.nhs.uk.