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This article presents the findings of parents' views on the human papillomavirus vaccine from one area of England. The authors outline that many parents have strong views about the vaccine particularly in relation to safety and effectiveness, age, and medical and moral concerns. This article presents an analysis of some of the issues. The authors conclude that nurses should provide up-to-date advice to help allay concerns.

Aim: To discover whether community children's nurses and other members of the multi-disciplinary team had changed their practice in the light of the 'copying letters' initiative recommended by the Department of Health and to seek their views on the process., Method: A documentary analysis of the notes was undertaken on 30 sets of notes chosen at random from the community children's nursing team's caseload and the total number of letters in each child's notes was retrospectively recorded for periods before and after the implementation of the 'copying letter initiative'. In addition, 14 community children's nurses were interviewed about their communication practice., Results: Letters accounted for 70 per cent of the total correspondence in the children's notes. Most of the 466 letters were from doctors (65 per cent) with nine per cent having been sent by community children's nurses. Before the initiative 70 per cent of letters from medical staff were copied compared to 74 per cent afterwards, with community children's nurses copying 19% of letters before and 47% afterwards. Only 13 were sent to the child. Nurses commented on changes to their practice since the copying initiative began and reported varying use of other forms of communication such as text messaging and email. CONCLUSION Professionals should be encouraged to copy letters to parents and children. A number of technologies are available to facilitate communication between patients, parents and other health care professionals. Careful consideration must be given to their introduction to ensure their use conforms to legal and professional codes and good practice principles.

Announcement of the introduction of the five-in-one vaccine (DTaP/IPV/Hib) into the primary immunisation schedule was made on 9 August 2004. In this study all calls to the immunisation hotline were recorded between 9 August 2004 and 19 November 2004, noting who called and the nature of their enquiry. A total of 208 calls were received during the study period, and of these 23 (11.1%) related to the new vaccine. Calls were from parents (10/23, 43%), health visitors (9/23, 39%) and practice nurses (3/23, 13%). A variety of themes were covered in calls including local availability of the five-in-one vaccine, vaccine safety, mercury content and efficacy. Calls not connected with the new vaccine concerned mostly adolescent MMR (17.3%) as there was a local mumps epidemic. Others related to clarification of a child's immunisation status (13.5%), primary MMR immunisation (13.5%), vaccination scheduling or administration difficulties (12%), other schedule (12.5%) and non-schedule vaccines (2.4%), vaccine reactions (2.4%), travel vaccines (6%), BCG (6%), and a few miscellaneous queries (3%). Overall questions about the new five-in-one vaccine accounted for an extra 23 calls to the immunisation hotline during the study period (11.1% of calls).

Key Practitioner Messages Copying correspondence and reports to parents is one approach to the principle of professionals working in partnership with parents., There is currently little research on what constitutes good practice in copying correspondence and reports to parents of maltreated children; a poor response rate limited the ability of this project to contribute to this., The difficulties encountered in obtaining ethical approval for this study have implications for other researchers in the child protection field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: To quantify use of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) in children with non-malignant, life-limiting illness. Method: A self-administered questionnaire was sent to families who received care from a community children's nursing and psychology team for children with non-malignant, life-limiting conditions. Results: A total of 32 per cent of respondents had used up to seven types of CAM for their child and 43.4 per cent had used CAM for themselves or other family members. Most parents used CAM to enhance general wellbeing rather than treat specific diagnoses. A total of 58.3 per cent felt the therapy was helpful, 50 per cent had tried conventional medicine first, and 63.9 per cent of users discussed their use of CAM with a doctor or community nurse. Conclusion: The rate of CAM use is significantly higher in this population than found in many previous cross-sectional studies. This may reflect the different needs and expectations of families with children with non-malignant, life-limiting illnesses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the impact of computer games on sleep in children. The authors state that studies show that computer game playing as well as television watching prior to sleep can impair the quality and quantity of sleep and can affect verbal cognitive performance of children. They stress that parents should be aware of these effects to provide adequate guidance to their children.