Transition from Child to Adult Health Services.

Abstract

Emeritus Professor Alan Glasper from the University of Southampton discusses the quest to improve transition processes and procedures to help young people with long-term conditions enter adult health services without further health problems arising. In this special issue of the journal edited by Nick Medforth, a children’s nursing academic from Liverpool John Moores University in the UK, various facets of transition from children’s services to adult services are explored. Continuing new developments in health have resulted in greater numbers of children who in the past would not have lived beyond their early years surviving into adulthood. Good transition to adult health services is important for all these young people with special health needs in order to maximize their lifelong access to health and their general well-being in society. Undoubtedly, because of these scientific breakthroughs and the resulting innovations in health care, greater numbers of children with long-term conditions are now living highquality lives well into adulthood. Importantly, the way in which children and young people are provided with health care has fundamentally changed over the past 50 years. Once simply passive recipients of health care delivery, children and young people are now encouraged to become active participants in decisions pertinent to their own health care delivery. Such strategies require nurses who can act as advocates for children and young people to help them enjoy the same rights accorded to all citizens including the right to participate in their own health care decisions (A. Glasper, 2010) COMPREHENSIVE CHILD AND ADOLESCENT NURSING 2023, VOL. 46, NO. 3, 159–161 https://doi.org/10.1080/24694193.2023.2198901