Safeguarding question

[Guineapigsandrabbits]

If a child in the care of a kinship carer gets hold of medication and overdoses is this a safeguarding issue? What could happen to the carer and teenager?

Any child overdosing is a safeguarding issue.

I don't think anyone will be able to tell you what the outcome will be.

A bog focus should be on how a future issue can be prevented. What needs to change so that this is never repeated?

It might also depend on how they got hold of the medication. Was it openly available e.g. left on the side in the bathroom? Or did they go into the care’s bedroom and go rifling through their stuff. I’d expect the first to be more of a concern. In the second case the child has gone out of their way to find the medication but the carer has attempted to keep it out of their way.

It may also depend on what they’ve overdosed on. Is it OTC paracetamol they brought themselves or you might expect to find in a medicine cabinet in case of mild pain. You might expect this to be accessible unless there have been previous overdose issues. Or is it prescription medication that should be kept out of harms way?

Thanks for the replies. It was an OTC medication. I guess time will tell how social services will view this.

Depends on so many variables.

My son took an overdose of otc meds when a teen. He took them from the bathroom cabinet. Nothing was fine as he was 15 and had not showed suicidal tendencies prior to that.

He then did it again, this time it was referred to SS. They investigated but he had acquired the meds outside the home so we were not culpable.

OK purplelovecats. This is a looked after child. Concerned about them being removed.

I think it’s relatively unlikely they’ll remove the child over an isolated incident.

they’ll probably want to know all details and hoe they accessed the meds. Likely they’ll want a robust plan to prevent it happening again.

Hi I'm a S.W. is want to know how it happened and what the impact was (ie was teen un harmed or really poorly) and then a safety plan about it not happening again. It would only go any further than that of there was other stuff going on or if it happened multiple times despite plans being put in place. If there was intent I would be looking at what support was there for the teen.

Two of our foster daughters take things that dont belong to them. This happens very early in the mornings between 2 and 4 am. Ive asked for advice from SW, 4 times now and get no help. Any suggestions please on how to prevent them from continuing?

Of course a child taking someone else medication is a safeguarding issue. Report it at once.and get him to A&E. Someone will look at circumstances of how it occurred to make sure it can't happen again.

Lock all drugs away and sleep with key under your pillow.

Very unlikely they would remove a DC over an isolated incident. There is a shortage of foster places and they would only remove a DC if they were neglected, abused etc. Just lock all meds in a cupboard/safe and keep the key in your bedroom.

What are the foster daughters taking? Is it medication or something else?
Do you have an up to date safe care plan? Can you email your fswkr and copy in their manager to ask the plan is reviewed immediately?