About Child Death Reviews
As part of every Child Death Review in LLR, any practitioners who were involved in the child's care during their life may be asked to participate in the review process, including through attending meetings or providing information via 'Reporting Forms'. This helps those carrying out the review to understand the care journey for that child by hearing from the front-line staff involved in providing care, and assists with the analysis and learning for every case. Reviews may involve staff from a wide range of services including hospital, community or primary care services, palliative care and hospice services, schools or nurseries, the police, Social Care and Early Help, or voluntary sector organisations.
All the information gathered as part of the Child Death Review process is shared with the National Child Mortality Database for England, to help build a national dataset to look at learning and themes around child mortality - this provides robust national data to help understand why children die, and how we can prevent future child deaths and improve care and outcomes for all children, young people and their families.
The National Child Mortality Database have lots of resources to support professionals through the review process, including guidance on participating in the process and on completing Reporting Forms.
If you have any queries about your participation in the LLR Child Death Review process, please contact: Melvinna West, CDOP Administrator - melvinna.west@nhs.net
Practitioner wellbeing & support
We recognise that for practitioners, working with a family who have lost a child, or participating in the child death review process, can be a difficult experience. We would encourage all practitioners to reach out for support within their own organisation. The following resources are also available for information and support:
Child Bereavement UK Resources for professionals (including Helpline): https://www.childbereavementuk.org/supporting-yourself-and-colleagues
Papyrus Debrief Service for any professionals impacted by suicide: https://www.papyrus-uk.org/debrief-service/
LLR CDOP 7 Minute Briefings
LLR CDOP have produced 7 Minute Briefings on the LLR Child Death Review process for different agencies below:
