Audit Matters 4-02

 

William Whitehouse, audit representative

 

Academic Child Health

E Floor East Block

Queen’s Medical Centre

Nottingham NG7 2UH

william.whitehouse@nottingham.ac.uk

 

I was delighted to be re-elected for a further 3 year term as Audit Rep. on the BPNA Council. I am very grateful to Carlos De Sousa for volunteering to help with the organisation and documentation, and the establishment of a BPNA audit toolbox, which will be available on the BPNA and PEIR websites in due course.

 

There were 11 at our informal open meeting at the Newcastle Annual Meeting 17.1.02 and apologies were received from a further 4. Topics discussed are reviewed below.

 

1.     Guillaine Barre syndrome. A draft web based guideline and resource, including draft audit data sheet, references and technical report is being prepared by Deirdre Peake (SpR Birmingham), Richard Appleton (Liverpool) and myself. It is almost ready for comments. We plan to post it on a web site soon, see next newsletter for further information. Richard Appleton has engaged Alder Hey Children’s Hospital in developing a detailed care-path, based on this preliminary work. Further help with this would be welcome, e.g. in undertaking a formal Delphi consensus exercise in due course. Contact William Whitehouse (Nottingham).

 

2.     ADEM has been suggested as a topic for future BPNA wide audit. Anyone interested in helping please contact Chris Rittey (Sheffield).

 

3.  Idiopathic (benign) Intracranial Hypertension. A questionnaire has been sent to consultant paediatric neurologists by Cathy White (Swansea) to ascertain our perceptions of our current management. A draft audit data sheet is under revision by Ming Lim (SpR Guy’s London). Jean Pierre Lin (Guy’s London) will approach his Local Research Ethics Committee about the issue of a register to audit diagnosis, treatment and outcomes. Contact Cathy White.

 

4.     Steroid treatment in epilepsy has been suggested as a topic for future BPNA wide audit. Anyone interested in helping please contact Peter Baxter (Sheffield).

 

5.     Headache in children. Data from a joint audit using a draft audit data sheet, developed by Ishaq Abu-Arefeh (Stirling & Glasgow), David Symon (Middlesborough), William Whitehouse (Nottingham) was presented at the BPNA (Callaghan M et al. Dev Med & Child Neurol 2002;43:S90:25). The group have also developed a very useful patient headache diary. There was an informal open meeting to discuss future projects 17.04.02 at York. Anyone interested in this or related paediatric headache issues please contact Ishaq Abu-Arefeh.

 

6.     Dancing Eye syndrome. Mike Pike (Oxford) has secured Oxford MREC approval for a register for a national survey. We hope to develop this as a first topic for a “BPNA Surveillance Unit” (BPNA-SU). Contact Mike Pike.

 

7.     Other topics at various stages, which will be included in the BPNA tool box include:

7.1   audit of first clinic attendance with suspected epilepsy

7.2   audit of seizure clinic patient and carer satisfaction

7.3   audit of convulsive status epilepticus in A&E

7.4   audit of pre-hospital use of rescue treatment for convulsive epileptic seizures

7.5   audit of refractory status epilepticus on PICU

7.6   audit of nutritional and biochemical effects of ketogenic diets

7.7   child’s Glasgow coma scale.

 

Contact William Whitehouse (Nottingham) for further information william.whitehouse@nottingham.ac.uk.