The National Deaf Children’s Society, the leading charity for children with a hearing loss, have a new free service.
Deafness can pose a significant risk to deaf children’s social, emotional and intellectual development. In some cases, a lack of parental support for the child’s hearing may constitute neglect.
To help practitioners meet the needs of deaf children, they have launched a new and free social care advisory service for social care as well as other professionals working with deaf children, young people and their families.
The advisory line will provide information and support to professionals looking for specialist advice on meeting the social care needs of children with any level of hearing loss when, for example, considering referrals, undertaking assessments or providing services to deaf children from early help through to statutory provision.
The support is available to staff in a range of social care services such as:
- Early support and intervention
- Assessment and intake
- Child protection/public protection teams
- Children disability teams
- Sensory Support teams
- Looked after and Leaving Care teams
- Fostering and adoption
- Leaving care
- Youth offending services
- Policy and planning services/Safeguarding children’s boards
The advice will be provided by our social care policy advisor with almost 20 years of experience as a qualified social worker working directly with deaf children and their families in social work settings.
Please see the attached leaflet for more information, or go to: www.ndcs.org.uk/socialcareadvice.