How much warning to give children for hospital appointments

[rainydaysandcake]

I have a 7 yr old who needs to go to hospital for investigations, but everytime I mention it they cry or get upset. Is it bad not to tell them until the day of the appointment so they don't worry ?

Why would you tell them before? My daughter is 2 but we only tell her as we get in the car to go to the hospital. We do a LOT of role-playing hospitals the rest of the time though and if I know she is having a specific procedure then I include that in our play.

Don't feel you need to give him loads of notice. Telling him on the morning is fine.

I give my 3yo lots of notice. She processes things by thinking about them in advance and imagining them and gradually coming round to the idea. She does not like surprises. Telling her on the day would be terrible for her. I suppose it depends on the child and how they process things.

My DD11 has a lot of hospital appointments, I usually tell her the day before - any more than that and she frets, telling her on the day makes her too anxious to cope so the day before works for her. The exception was when she was having surgery, we talked about that from her pre-surgery assessment about 10 days prior, explained what was involved, created a visual timetable for her etc. She coped really well with that and we’ll do the same when she has corrective surgery next year.

My DD also has complex support needs, developmental delay etc so we need to take care with her in a way we might not with a neurotypical child.