Press release
Minister Anne Rabbitte welcomes 85 additional therapy posts for children’s disability services
From Department of Health
Published on
Last updated on
From Department of Health
Published on
Last updated on
Minister of State with responsibility for Disability, Anne Rabbitte TD, today welcomed the provision of 85 additional therapy posts.
Minister Rabbitte said:
"Today, I very much welcome the news that 85 whole time equivalent additional posts have been approved for the HSE Children’s Disability Network Teams. On 8 April, I requested that the HSE pause the planned relocation of on-site health and social care professionals from Special Schools to Children Disability Network Teams following concerns expressed to me from some parents and schools.
"Working closely with Government, the HSE has been reviewing the services in special schools to ensure that these schools fully benefit from the enhanced provision afforded by Children's Disability Network Teams, as envisaged under the Progressing Disability Services for Children and Young People Programme (PDS).
"The HSE has confirmed that existing therapeutic on-site services provided to the small number of special schools will continue to be provided. There will be no reduction in services to this group of children, while services will be delivered in line with the PDS policy under the governance structure of the newly configured local children's disability network teams.
"The HSE and their Section 38 and 39 lead agency partners are mindful to reassure parents with children attending special schools of their commitment to build the capacity of these network teams to give greater levels of interdisciplinary supports.
"I want to assure parents, that Government and the HSE remain committed to the implementation of the PDS model. These 85 additional posts that are now approved for the CDNTs will support the delivery of services in these special schools. The relevant staff will become part of the local CDNT where they will receive their clinical governance and supervision while therapists will be assigned to provide in-reach therapy to the special school. Importantly, the children’s disability network teams’ model will provide enhanced access to wider interdisciplinary supports for all children with complex needs.
"I welcome this development and I am pleased that these children and their families will have access to the full range of services and supports of the CDNT according to their individual needs."
A number of service improvements are being introduced that, when implemented, will help improve access to services for children with disabilities and developmental delays. The overall programme of improvement is the ongoing roll out of Progressing Disability Services for Children and Young People.
Progressing Disability Services for Children and Young People sets out a programme to reconfigure specialist therapy services for children with disabilities into 91 specialist area-based interdisciplinary Children’s Disability Network Teams (CDNTs) to work with children aged from birth to 18 years with complex disability needs. CDNTs are teams of health and social care professionals, including occupational therapy, psychology, nursing, physiotherapy, speech and language therapy, social work and others. The team will work closely together in a family centred model, focussing on the child’s and family’s own priorities. Once all teams are in place, every child with complex needs will have access to a team, regardless of the nature of their disability, where they live, or the school they attend.
This requires the reorganisation of all current HSE and HSE funded children’s disability services into geographically-based CDNTs. This is occurring through forming partnerships between all the disability organisations in an area and pooling their staff with expertise in the different types of disabilities to form the CDNTs. This reconfiguration of services under PDS is in line with Health Service Reform and the implementation of Community Healthcare Networks under Sláintecare. PDS aligns with two clear objectives of the Sláintecare Report to:
Children and their families will have access to the full range of services and supports of the CDNT according to their individual needs. This includes universal, targeted and specialist supports, such as individual therapeutic intervention and access to specialist consultation and assessment when needed. Supports will be provided as is feasible in the child’s natural environments – their home, school and community.
This has been an area that was impacted by available staff resources over the years relative to need, with the result that considerable waiting lists had built up. To tackle the backlog, in September 2020 Government provided €7.8m to address the backlog for overdue Assessments of Need. By the end of April 2021 80% of 6,500 children have had their assessment and the rest be cleared shortly.
100 development posts have been allocated in 2021 to children’s disability services. The first tranche of 50 posts have been allocated to Community Health Organisation (CHO) areas based on the ratio of current staff to children with disabilities. Each CHO area has worked with lead agencies in their area to agree the allocation of these posts by grade and network. The HSE is finalising the allocation of the second 50 posts. In addition, 85 additional posts are now approved for the CDNTs. This will allow existing posts in special schools to become part of the local CDNT where they will receive their clinical governance and supervision while therapists will be assigned to provide in-reach therapy to the special school.