Who we are

Welcome to our website. You should find all of the information about our service and any current changes to our service here, as well as some useful documents and website links. If you have any further questions please do not hesitate to contact us (information at the bottom of this page.)

The Solihull Paediatric Physiotherapy team consists of qualified Physiotherapists and Therapy Support Workers. Your child’s initial assessment will always be carried out by a qualified Physiotherapist and on going treatments may be completed by a Physiotherapist or Therapy Support Workers  depending on your child’s needs. All of our Physiotherapists are registered with the Health Care Professionals Council (HCPC).

Our Physiotherapy team members

Cassie Neville – Clinical Team Lead Paediatric Therapies and Pelvic Health

Cath Kear – Acting Paediatric Physiotherapy Team Lead

Kiran Sandhu – Specialist Paediatric Physiotherapist

Laura Pickup – Specialist Paediatric Respiratory Physiotherapist

Emma Dunn- Specialist Paediatric Physiotherapist Lead for SEND

Joanne Shakespeare- Therapy Support Worker

The Trust is committed to learning and provides student placements for Physiotherapy students studying at The University of Birmingham and Coventry University. There may be occasions where your child is seen by a student physiotherapist under the guidance of a qualified physiotherapist. If you would prefer for this not to happen, please let us know.

What do we do?

The Paediatric Physiotherapy service provides a community advice and assessment service and recommends strategies to support children with gross motor delays, neurological and neuromuscular conditions. We provide a musculoskeletal service for those up to  children under 7 years of age (Children aged 7 years and over are seen by the adult musculoskeletal service).

Levels of intervention include:-

• Acute/Short Term – Your child may be assessed, treatment/advice provided and discharged from the service, or they may require an onward referral to a different service and be discharged from Physiotherapy.
• Long Term – Your child may require on going assessment / treatment / review / provision of equipment / onward referrals and may possibly remain under our service until they transition to adult services, if this is appropriate.

We work within a variety of settings within the community and in line with the NHS Long Term Plan, our service is offering a blended approach of telephone consultations, video appointments and face to face appointments based on the needs identified of children, young people and families in Solihull.

The service also provides a community respiratory service for children with complex disabilities who have respiratory complications. Please see the ‘Respiratory Physiotherapy Service’ section for further information on this area of our service.

We prioritise assessment requests from the SEND team for new Education, Health and Care Needs Assessment for children known to our service.

Please note that currently there is increased demand for our services at this time so please be aware that we have developed a longer waiting list during this period across all our services. We are steadily working through this whilst ensuring we are responsive to urgent needs.

• If parents or professionals are concerned a child’s needs have changed considerably since they were referred to the service please get in touch to provide up to date information for our service to review and triage.
• We have developed a number of useful resources and videos on this website which you may find useful to review

Please be assured we are doing all we can to prioritise patient and staff safety. Thank you for your understanding and support.

Be Respectful

If someone has a complaint or comment about the quality of treatment they have received, they should get in touch with PALS immediately by emailing pals@uhb.nhs.uk or telephoning 0121 424 0808 so we can look into the issue as quickly and effectively as possible.

Personal attacks in person, on the telephone or online will only delay the ability to assess the reason for the enquiry.

We understand that this is a stressful time but please be respectful to our staff. We have a “zero tolerance” policy to verbally abusive (including shouting, swearing and the use of derogatory language), physically abusive, harassing and threatening behaviour to our staff.