During a Child’s Plan meeting, the meeting will hear from all of the professionals working with the child or young person, as well as the child or young person themselves. The school may have asked the child or young person to complete a questionnaire to share their views. This is usually based around the SHANARRI health and wellbeing indicators. This is not always the best way of gathering information, in particular from a child or young person who may have cognitive functioning difficulties, demand avoidance or regressed/disinhibited behaviours.
When attending a Child’s Plan meeting it can be useful to prepare by considering the impact of PANS against the SHANARRI indicators. This will support the professionals in the meeting to understand the impact of PANS on the child or young person within their practice model. This can help professionals consider what supports might be suitable.
If parents / carers are struggling with dealing with the challenging symptoms of PANS or are in any way in dispute with the school or any other services, we highly recommend taking a supporter, such as an independent advocate to Child’s Plan meetings.
To support this, we have created a PANS Passport, this is designed to
- Help parents, carers and the child or young person communicate the impact of their illness.
- Allow parents / carers and children / young people to discuss and agree in advance the important factors that they believe need shared in a meeting.
- If the child or young person has an advocate, it can be used to discuss with them in advance of the meeting.
- Allow tracking of changes and effectiveness of support (if completed ahead of each child’s plan meeting)
To support completion of the passport, we have developed a guidance document. This looks at each of the SHANARRI wellbeing indicators and considers the symptoms of PANS that may impact on that area of health and wellbeing. This can help provoke thinking about how each child or young person is individually affected./
