SEND Surgeries
SEND Surgeries provide parent carers with an opportunity to drop-in, ask questions and speak with a range of professionals.
The range of officers/professionals attending surgeries has increased in 2024 offering a wider breadth of advice and support to parent carers. Members of the SEND Team and the Local Offer Team are always in attendance, with occasional representation from SENDIASS Southend, the Lighthouse and Jigsaws team, the Occupational Therapy Team, Supporting Families Team, the Elective Home Education Team, the Inclusion Team, Specialist Teaching Team, Bladder and Bowel service, Oral Health Team, the home to school travel team and the School Nursing Service.
11 SEND surgeries were held in 2024, taking place once a month apart from August 2024 due to the school summer holidays.
Surgery attendance
The total number of parent carers attending surgeries in 2024 was 77 (more than double the number who attended in 2023).
- average number of parent carers per surgery: 7
- highest parent carer attendance at a surgery: 18 (January 2024)
- lowest parent carer attendance at a surgery: 3 (May and June 24)
Feedback from parent carers
Feedback at the surgeries:
53 parent carers (69% of attendees) completed feedback sheets at the surgery. 100% of people said they found the surgery helpful.
Comments:
- Very useful/informative – 4 people
- very useful session and felt welcome
- very helpful and friendly
- very helpful - lots of resources and support
- all staff lovely to talk to, plenty of staff to talk to in different areas
- Very proud to join this surgery. It's been very helpful, and staff are cordially help us their best
- It would be great to organise it with a school SENCo present
- It's really good to meet with people handling our concerns. Might be useful to have some engagement between SEND and CAMHS advice
- Thank you, all so friendly and helpful
- it was very helpful and refreshing to be able to ask questions and have our doubts answered
- Lisa from SENDIASS was very helpful and really listened, with wonderful links and advice going forward
- Wonderfully organised, informative, everyone very approachable, patient and understanding
- needs to be advertised more
- they are very informative, patient and understanding
- nice and informative with good information given
- more often, very informative, thank you!
- helpful, kind, informative, non-judgemental. Thank you.
- it helped a lot. Found out many things I didn't know
- good to talk through concerns
- really beneficial and friendly
- it is a safe place to discuss concerns about our children, school and personal life questions. Thank you for this opportunity
- I spoke to the reps from the Lighthouse. All were very informative, and I feel much more relaxed about our journey
- The information shared was helpful. I liked that the officer attending to me responded promptly and sent email of enquiry about my issue on the spot
- Amazing advice from all professionals in attendance. I really felt listened to.
- Very helpful, thank you. Exactly how it is set up helps give me the support needed to continue to help support my son
- Very helpful. He was referred to school nurse, which I was not aware of. Please so these sessions more often.
- It is very helpful. I got all the information I needed
- really helpful and need more sessions
- really warm and friendly team of people. Glad I came
- lots of helpful people that have provided useful information
- it has been very helpful, and everyone was happy to listen
- SAVS could have been here and someone from DWP
- keep doing it
Follow up feedback:
A follow up survey is sent to parent carers 2 to 3 months after attending a surgery. 9 parent carers have completed surveys.
Responses:
- How helpful was the information and advice you were given, with 1 being not at all helpful and 5 being very helpful? 3 people scored 3; 2 people scored 4 and 4 people scored 5. Average rating: 4.1
- Were you given clear advice, guidance and information? – everyone said yes.
- Were you able to take any practical action as a result of the advice and guidance given? 7 people said yes, 1 person said no and 1 person said it was not applicable or too early to say.
- Has there been any positive impact from the action or actions you have taken? 4 people said yes and 3 people said it was too early to say. 2 people did not answer the question.
- Would you recommend the surgeries to other parents or carers? 7 people said yes. The other 2 people did not answer the question.
Do you have any other feedback about the surgery and/or suggestions for improvement?:
- Felt really supported having the opportunity to speak to professionals specifically about our SEN journey and the guidance was invaluable to talking the next steps so thank you so much!!
- Definitely needs to be more advertising. So many parents would benefit but didn't know about it
- More date/time options for working parents to attend
Child ages of parent carers attending surgeries
Child ages of those attending surgeries for whom advice was sought ranged from 2.5 to 17 years. There is a predominance of primary age children which is probably due to the fact that most surgeries are hosted at primary schools (although they are open to any parent carer in Southend).
- Pre-school age (up to and including 4 years old): 9 children
- Primary school age (up to and including 10 years old): 44 children
- Secondary school age (11 to 16): 9 children
- Post 16: 1 young person