Leicester's Teddy Bear Hospital

Aim:

To overcome children’s fears about hospitals through play. To improve the communication skills of medical students by increasing their opportunities to meet young children History of Leicester’s Teddy bear hospital

Teddy Bear Hospital is a new initiative piloted by trainee doctors aimed at helping children to appear less nervous about visiting hospitals. Children are encouraged to bring in their teddy bears and cuddly toys so that the trainee doctors can diagnose their ailments and make them feel better. Many children are intimidated in hospital environments and this interactive initiative is aimed at reducing any anxiety the children may have about the hospital environment and the medical procedures carried out. In addition the medical students gain valuable experience communicating with children

Leicesters Teddy Bear Hospital was one of the first few Teddy Bear Hospitals in England and was set up by a medical student, Steve Dyer, who was inspired by a similar scheme at Guys, Kings and St Thomas’s school of medicine in London. Right from the first session in January 2005 Teddy bear hospital has been committed to reducing children’s anxieties about hospital procedures through play. It has an informal approach and every session is organised with the teachers from the school to ensure that each session is tailored to the schools needs.

The initial idea of Teddy Bear Hospital was to bring children into the Leicester Hospitals so that they not only got to see medical equipment but also got used to the environment of the hospital. Sadly, this has not been logistically possible so we take the Teddy Doctors out into the schools instead. This last year we have undoubtedly grown in size, we now have 20 schools on our list which just keeps on growing! We have also succeeded in running an evening session at a local Rainbows group and we then followed this up with our first session without teddy bears for some older children! We are now currently in the process of expanding the project to involve older children.

A typical teddy bear hospital clinic

The teddy bear clinic is a mobile clinic consisting of all the equipment needed to examine and treat around 40 poorly teddy bears in a morning. The teddy bear hospital and eight teddy bear doctors head to local schools to teach 4-6 year olds about the work doctors do through play.

Sessions start with a short introduction from the teddy doctors, before splitting the class into pairs or small groups. The children (and their sick bears) then travel around a circuit of activities, which teach about various scenarios that they may encounter in a hospital. This includes a private consultation with a teddy doctor followed by stations where children can look at x-rays, identify bones, bandage their bear, use stethoscopes to listen to hearts, talk about their own experiences in hospitals and even perform an operation.

The whole session with up to 20 children lasts for 40-45 minutes. At the end of this time the children are brought back together to reflect on their morning and are presented with a certificate each and a reward sticker for well-behaved teddies!

Nearly 2700 TEDDY BEARS TREATED!

2768 TEDDY BEARS TREATED!! Since its first session Leicester teddy bear hospital has gone from strength to strength and by the end of the 2008 academic year will hope to have treated over 3000 teddy bears around Leicester in around 80 different clinics. At these clinics we’ve seen a range of complaints with the most common being

Accidental injuries caused by falling out of bed
Lacerations causing stuffing to fall out
Chicken pox
Tummy aches

Currently we have 20 primary schools on our list which has been plenty to keep us busy all year. We are always willing to take on new schools and community groups

Funding

The initial funds for Teddy Bear Hospital came from the Leicester Medics revue and the Leicester branch of a charity called MedSIN kindly took us under their umbrella as a subsiduary organisation allowing us to use their charity status and treasury.

The outgoing costs of teddy bear hospital have so far been very low as we have received a huge amount of support from many people. The UHL play service provided us with a lot of play equipment to get us started and an annual donation from Frank Sammeroff Ltd of Bandages and Dressings has kept us in stock of disposable items.

Teddy Bear Hospital is fully dependant on peoples’ willingness to give their time and enthusiasm to make the sessions successful. All sessions are completely free to schools.

Contacts

Schools co-ordinator: Jodie Sabin

Student co-ordinator: Pip Jones

Resources: Salma Ali

Email: teddybear@le.ac.uk

Website: www.leicesterteddybearhospital.com

"If people feel they understand the world around them, or, probably, even if they have the conviction that they could understand it if they wanted to, then and only then are they also able to feel that they can make a difference through their decisions and activities." Frank Oppenheimer in "The Exploratorium"

Press

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4400945.stm

http://www.le.ac.uk/sm/le/newsletter/LWMS%20summer05.pdf

Last updated on Monday 15 October 2007 at 14:47.

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