The Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH) Play Department has the largest hospital play team in Europe, and they are dedicated to put the child first and always by providing holistic care to patients and their families. The Play Team at GOSH consists of 10 Senior Health Play Specialist, 18 Health Play Specialists and 19 Play Workers with a total of 47 team members. Out of 47, 32 Play Team members work full time which means that only 68% of staff are here Monday-Friday. 27 inpatient wards are supported by the Play Team along with Radiology and Outpatient clinics.

With the number of staff in the team and the clinical areas which need supporting by play, we need to see how many play sessions are conducted on a weekly basis and to see if there are gaps in the play service provision. This is important to know as we have a responsibility to support opportunities for children and young people to play while they are receiving healthcare and is in line with the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, Article 31.

To answer this question there has been collaborative working with the Play Department and the Quality Improvement Team to create a digital data collection system to collate the different actions that the Play Team would conduct on a daily basis. This includes the type of play that was conducted and the location of the play within GOSH. Between January-June 2023, the Play Department collected data using the digital collection system which has been shared with the GOSH Charity as they fully fund the Play Department. With this data we are able to see which clinical areas are having less play service provision and that it correlates with the number of staff allocated to those areas.