The School Nursing team is offering free virtual events on school readiness and early toileting for parents and carers this summer.
The School Nursing team works across Surrey to promote physical health and emotional wellbeing in schools and in the community and is made up of school nurses, registered nurses, senior health practitioners and Community Nursery Nurses.
Our teams have a wealth of experience in supporting the health needs of children and families and each Surrey school has a local school nursing team to support them.
Free virtual sessions for parents and carers on School Readiness
Parents/carers are invited to get school ready by attending a free virtual school readiness session with our School Nursing team on:
- Wednesday 26 June from 2.00pm to 3.00pm.
- Wednesday 3 July from 10.00am to 11.00am.
You can also visit the In Our Place website for a range of support in helping your child move to a new school, download our school readiness checklist and visit our Speech and Language tips for getting ready for school page.
Free virtual sessions for parents and carers on Early Toileting
Join our Early Toileting virtual session with our Senior Health Practitioner for Enuresis on:
- Wednesday 26 June from 10.00am to 11.00am.
- Wednesday 3 July from 2.00pm to 3.00pm.
Bedwetting
Bed wetting is very common in children under the age of 7 years.
- 1 in 5 children at the age of 5 years are still wet
- 1 in 7 children at the age of 7 years are still wet
While this can be stressful and embarrassing for children and their families, there is plenty of support available.
Tips for children
- Go for a wee regularly (about six times a day)
- Try and relax when having a wee
- Make sure you wee before going to sleep
- The more you drink the more your bladder is trained to hold.
To help your bladder hold more wee, it is important that you:
- Have regular drinks (6 to 8 x 200ml cups) throughout the day to help your bladder learn how to hold larger amounts of wee. Your child’s teacher can support you with this during term time.
- Drink whole cups NOT sips as this will help to stretch your bladder
- Experiment with avoiding certain drinks such as blackcurrant juice, fizzy drinks or milk drinks especially before bed.
- Water is best.
- Keep having drinks up until 1½ hours before bed
- During the final 1 to 2 hours before bed it is okay to have a sip of water to drink, if needed.
Tips for parents/carers
- Is there a regular pattern to the wet nights and if so, is there something you can implement to change the cycle?
- If you want to reward your child, reward changes they can make such as increased drinking in the day and going to the toilet before going to sleep. The reward only needs to be small.
- Talk to your child about making it easier to go to the toilet at night. For example, if your child doesn’t like getting up at night because it’s too dark, consider using a ‘special’ torch / light.
- If your child is in a bunk bed or has to go up or down stairs to the toilet, can you change where they sleep for a short while?
- Try and avoid lifting children to the toilet when they are not fully awake and therefore not the ‘boss of their bladder’. This leads to their bladder learning to empty when not full which is not the outcome we are looking for.
- If you do use lifting on special occasions, for example, while away on holiday, make sure you wake them at different times each night.
- It may help to stop using pull ups at night; this allows the child to recognise that they are wet and prompt them to use the toilet. Remember to use protective covers for the bed.
- Constipation can contribute to bed wetting so ensure your child has plenty of fruit and vegetables.
Remember bed wetting is not the child’s fault.
Find our more including how to make a referral to an enuresis (bedwetting) clinic on our Continence page.
Free online courses about understanding your child, teenager and relationships
Free online courses about understanding your child, teenager and relationships are available for families living in Surrey. The courses include top tips from childcare, education and NHS health experts.
You can get free lifetime access to the courses by using the code 'ACORN' and visiting the In our place website.
Do you know how the School Nursing team can support you?
• Being available to young people, parents, carers, and teaching staff to address any concerns about a child’s health.
• Providing health advice to help children and young people make the most of their education.
• Completing health reviews with children starting primary
• Deliver the National Child Measurement programme.
• Supporting young people who have specific medical needs and providing relevant training for staff to help manage these needs.
• Delivering classroom-based health education
• Supporting immunisation programmes in school
• Leading community clinics to help children with night-time wetting.
You can find out more, including contact details for your local team on our School Nursing page.