Our service is provided to infants and children who have physical difficulties with eating and drinking. This includes problems with sucking, biting, chewing and swallowing.
We have an open referral system via a specific referral form. Children are allocated to and assessed by different team members related to age/context. ( i.e. triage sytem)
Our aim is to assess their eating and drinking difficulties and reduce the risk of harm by providing targeted advice and intervention. We aim to ensure that the children remain safe to eat and/or drink orally and avoid the significant health issues associated with dysphagia.
We work alongside the families and other health services including dieticians, occupational therapists, health visitors, doctors and community nurses. We also provide training on dysphagia management.
We provide training sessions on the identification and management of feeding difficulties for families and health care /education services
We provide our service in the child's home and school as appropriate and also in joint clinics with dieticians.
Intervention is based on identifying risk and providing targeted advice/management which can include modified texture, adapted equipment, referral for seating/optimising positioning, specific techniques/exercises and in some situations referral for highly specialist clinical assessments such as videofluroscopy.
We do not provide assessment and intervention for children with behavioural and sensory feeding difficulties.
Werneth Primary Care Centre,
Featherstall Rd South,
Oldham,
OL9 7AY