Dolphin Ward provides a high quality service to infants, children & adolescents up to 16 years of age with a variety of needs including:
- Acute medical conditions both infectious and non-infectious.
- Chronic medical conditions which require continuing care and the education of children and their families.
- Acute surgical conditions. Children under 1 year are automatically transferred to a regional centre. The treatment or transfer of older children is at the discretion of the surgical and anaesthetic teams, dependent upon the childs condition.
- Planned surgery including urology, ENT, dental, maxillo-facial & orthopaedics. These children occasionally require overnight stays, although the majority are now performed in the Day Unit, with children being discharged home the same day.
- Trauma and orthopaedics.
As far as possible we try to allocate children a bed in a bay according to their age, with younger children admitted into Smugglers Cove & the adolescents into Coral Reef.
Parents are encouraged to remain with their child with space for one parent to sleep next to them on a fold up bed.
The parents kitchen/sitting room and bathroom provide additional facilities. A number of our children have their care shared with a tertiary centre, we have links with The Royal London Hospital, Great Ormond Street Hospital and Addenbrookes amongst others. Children may receive continuing care in the community from a dedicated team of Community Childrens Nurses.
