NHS refusing treatment to child who attends private school.

The OT she wants is a fraction of the price privately & delivered incredibly quickly compared to what the NHS can give to state school. I suppose that’s why. In most cases the school will also be willing to pay for the therapies with the condition they keep any equipment.

Access through the GP. As the article says and as has been pointed out repeatedly on the thread.

This is the problem with the headlines in the daily mail and other papers ... no facts just the attention grabbing nonsense .. its the fault of labour tax ... noinwont repeat other posters but it's a contracted package nhs vs la and la schools

.... and it's very hard to get for children in state schools also. The school have budgets to spend and provate or state have to decide how to spend it.

Both private and state could choose to spend huge amounts on OT ... or not... or just a little. Its up to them... but they don't.

I'm paying £150 per week for my child to have an OT in mainstream... we need ehcp (currently.in progress) For it to be paid. Trying to get an nhs referral is a no as it's not classed "medical"

I don't get how people can comment rhat its awful and be so appalled without knowing the facts... but i suppose I can when we live in a daily mail world.

What about home schoolers?

It could be argued that a private school could arrange a contract with a private medical provider, but someone home schooling cannot.

How you can't believe anything in the papers.

Has it always been so but now more blatant?

Better off with the Beano!

To be honest even if your child attends LA (mainstream) schools, parents and carers still end up paying for OTs, Ed. Psych, SaLT assessments. Dyslexia and Sensory Processing assessments have been taken out of many LAs 'offer'. This is even with the 'Golden Ticket' EHCP. We had to 'promise' to pay for an out of area specialist NHS clinic before we could go on a year long waiting list. We then had to 'battle' with our LA because it was a "private' assessment (their definition, as we funded it). Even though there was no provision locally either NHS or Private that could assess our medically complex child (their words after sending us to various unqualified people). We even helped the paediatrician fill out the funding request forms to our local clinical commissioning group (as they were called then). They'd never done one before, so welcome for that teaching moment! We were denied funding. We initially decided to keep them in mainstream and rely on the system, we would pay for their assessments (if not available or multiple year waits) rather than pay for private education, assessments and provision ourselves. This was made very clear to us, you go self funded private school route you fund everything. After two years of verbal and physical abuse, our lovely child has been brutalised enough. We're now looking at specialist provision, which means, at least from what we've researched so far a much more limited academic education, which is awful as they were looking to do Geography, two languages (specialist interest) Computer studies along with English Lit. and Lang. Maths and Science at GCSE. Now were looking at provisions that can offer maybe English and Maths GCSE, with other functional courses. Great for some but not for our child and many others! At least they'll leave school without mental illness, we'll have to see about funding tutors and exam fees for the other GCSEs ourselves. *HEAVY sarcasm implied

They can access it (as my privately educated DD did) via an NHS clinic setting - its just that the OT won't go into a private school to deliver therapy - it is provided but the child has to go to the OT rather than the OT going to the child.

In law, health care provision which educates or trains is deemed to be special educational provision. That includes OT. Not all special educational provision is provided by teachers.

There doesn’t need to be a duplicate service. It’s just different ways of accessing it. And the article clearly states that it can be accessed via the GP, so what you consider ‘unlikely’ isn’t very relevant.

If the local paediatric OT service supporting children in schools is provided via a contract with the council specified as only being available to state educated children, then it seems unlikely that there would be a duplicate service for other children referred by GPs.

They aren’t denying them OT. They are denying some of them OT through this route. They can get it via this route if they have an EHCP, and if not they can access it via a GP. Nobody is being denied anything. There are different routes to getting it depending on circumstances.

@FairKoala the system is already totally crap for families where a DC can't cope with school. Luckily we didn't get to this point but if we hadn't found a school for DS we would never have EHE due to this meaning the LEA would have no further responsibility for the DC.

If parents are able and choose to opt in to private education, they are choosing to opt out of the LEA provision

What about the parents who don’t choose to privately educate their children but because the state system and the LEA has opted out of educating their children it is the only option for them or one parent gives up their job to stay at home and educate their child.

For a lot of people private education is not a choice they wanted to make but one that is forced upon them.

They equally can’t opt out of paying for these services.

But the service can take their money and opt out of educating or treating their child

Wonder what will happen when child turns 18 and because they didn’t receive the treatment or education they needed as a child then they cannot work as an adult

But my DS provision for his DCD is in section F on his EHCP due to the OT specifically saying IT'S EDUCATION.

Private school children are at least visible and surrounded by professionals. By saying only state educated children can access this healthcare provision you are also denying it to home educated children who are a very much more vulnerable group. What justification is there for denying OT to the many autistic children who are home educated because they cannot cope in school?

Epilepsy is health. Developmental coordination disorder, hypotonia, hypertonia, cerebral palsy, deafness, injury etc are also health.

It is not just this. DCs got the “Queen Elizabeth: A Platinum Jubilee Celebration” book in state primary a few years back. Prep schools did not get it. I think it came directly from the DFE. Blatant discrimination. As we got 2 copies, we gave one to a neighbour’s child in a private school. Given all the local private schools here do have to register with the local authority now, I think that was disgraceful as well.

’Council’ and ‘local education authority’ are not interchangeable terms. The council is the local education authority but is not only the local education authority; the council clearly has responsibilities beyond that of being a local education authority.

An OT is a registered healthcare professional.

You obviously know nothing about OT.
Anti epileptic medication is health.
OT can be health or occupational. If a worker who is deaf does a job that needs hearing/understanding speech an OT can help with this. If they do a different job they would need different help.
When my DS was starting school he needed help with cutting, sticking, PE. Now he needs help with handwriting, typing. Essentially a different job.

I just googled and you're right - I like learning new things.

However, the council is also a corporate parent for all looked-after children - that doesn't mean that all services are directly relevant or available to looked after children. So I don't think 'the LEA' and 'the council' are interchangeable terms, which seems to be what you're suggesting. It's not trickery or distraction.

In this case, funding is available for a cohort of children to access OT services. Part of the criteria is being a pupil at a state school. The fact that it looks very much like an NHS-funded service is very unhelpful, and maybe it needs to be made clearer - the people ideally placed to do this would be the independent schools the children go to, and probably before parents choose the school, so they can make a fully-informed choice.

The NHS is not available for hire by private charities.

No. The Local Education Authority is not part of the council; it is the council. It is the authority responsible for educating children within that area, not a council department.

My daughter had mental health OT and I think it was one of the most important bits pf the life-changing support she received. I am so grateful to the OTs who worked with her.

The LEA is one part of children's services, which is one part of the council. It uses specific funding to provide services for state-educated children. The funding provided is specifically for state-educated children, and there are really clear accounting practices to ensure the money is spent on what it is intended for.

There are other parts of children's services which provide other services, such as safeguarding. Some will be part of the council and part of children's services but not part of the LEA. Some funding is for services which are available for everyone; others are restricted to certain populations.

Accounting is a way of making decisions, through budgeting, and the making sure those decisions are adhered to. It's not a trick - it's deliberate. It's just that most decisions about limited resource allocation mean some people get things and some people don't, or get it later.

Education isn't fair. It's inherently unfair that some children are unable to access mainstream education due to SEN. Some local authorites have better alternative provision. Some parents are able to access private provision because they can afford it. Some parents are able to access better provision because they can navigate systems. It's really unfair that some people have a lifelong disadvantage because they can't access the right education as children. It just is unfair and it's wrong.

If parents are able and choose to opt in to private education, they are choosing to opt out of the LEA provision. In this case, that includes LEA-funded OT (but not health-funded OT). I wish they had better choices available.

The alternative is to campaign for a return to centralised services, where all spending is dictated by Whitehall, and everyone gets an identical offer of services, and there is no private education or healthcare - that would be fair.