Questions and Answers

Your Questions Answered

Find answers to frequently asked questions from parents, carers, and young people about school health and wellbeing. Our Solihull School Nursing team provides expert, evidence-based guidance on topics such as emotional health, healthy lifestyles, sleep, and development — helping you access the right support at the right time.

Tips on Toileting

Did you know about 1 in 5 5–6-year-olds and 1 in 8 7–9-year-olds experience enuresis (bedwetting) during the night?

Some useful tips for parents and carers:

Encourage your child to drink plenty of fluids at regular intervals.
Drink at least one and a half to two litres per day.
Fizzy beverages, hot chocolate, fizzy and blackcurrant drinks should be avoided where possible. Milk or water is recommended.
Encourage your child to use the toilet before bed and again before going to sleep to ensure an empty bladder at sleep time.
Reassure your child it is not their fault!

Praise: Concentrate on dry nights, giving praise and encouragement.

Focus on improvement NOT on wet nights!

Constipation is really common in young children (it affects up to about a third of all children at some point) and there are lots of things that you can do to help prevent and treat it.

The key things to think about are diet, fluids and physical activity as getting all these things right is the key to prevention. We would recommend keeping your child well hydrated by offering plenty of water and foods that contain lots of water (e.g. cucumber, strawberries, grapes), lots of fibre in their diet (fruit, vegetables, beans, cereals and wholewheat bread/pasta) and plenty of exercise to help keep their bowel moving. Having a good toilet routine is important too. Children are more likely to have their bowels open around 20-30 minutes after a meal so that’s a good time to take them to the toilet.

If you’ve tried these things and they haven’t helped or if your child is having hard, infrequent bowel movements and finding having a bowel movement distressing, we would recommend contacting the GP as soon as possible to discuss laxatives and implement the advice above at the same time.

Being constipated can cause other issues like making toilet training more difficult and urine infections, so it’s really important to get it treated quickly.

The ERIC website (https://www.eric.org.uk/) provides help and support in dealing with bowel and bladder health for children and young people. Services include a helpline service for families and downloadable resources to name a few. The Helpline Advisors are trained to provide information and support on daytime wetting, bedwetting, constipation and soiling.

ERIC can be contacted on a free helpline: 0808 801 0343 Monday to Thursday, 10am - 2pm, or via email: web@eric.org.uk

For further advice and support on toileting, please contact the Solihull School Nursing team 0121 726 6754.

Dental Health

A regular teeth-cleaning routine is essential for good dental health.

Cleaning Teeth is really important when caring for your children’s teeth. To clean them thoroughly, you will need to encourage your child to brush them for two minutes, twice a day, particularly at night. There's no need to buy special "children's toothpaste" as some of them don’t have enough fluoride in them to help prevent tooth decay. If you’re unsure, ask your dentist for more support with choosing the right toothpaste. Remember, children from the age of seven can use family toothpaste.

After brushing with a pea size amount, encourage them to spit out excess toothpaste, but not to rinse with lots of water.

Rinsing with water after tooth brushing will wash away the fluoride and make it less effective. Teeth are at most risk at night because there is less saliva in the mouth to protect them; hence, decay can eat away and damage your children’s teeth. Water is the best drink to give at bedtime, but if you do give milk, don't add anything to it. Chocolate-flavoured drinks and milkshake powder usually contain sugars, which will increase the risk of decay.

From the age of seven, a child should be able to brush their own teeth, but it's still a good idea to watch them now and again to make sure they brush properly and for about two minutes.

Regular dental check-ups are also important, and NHS dental care for children is free.

When you visit the dentist, be positive about it and make the trip fun. This will stop your child worrying about future visits. For more information, please follow the link below:

Children's teeth - NHS

If you require information about how to register with a Dentist, please call the NHS Helpline on 111 or go to Find a dentist - NHS to find a dentist near you.

For further advice and support on dental care, please contact the Solihull School Nursing Team 0121 726 6754.

Handwashing

Having good hand hygiene is important to help reduce the risk of spreading infections, such as the common cold, influenza, COVID, and sickness infections such as Norovirus and Gastroenteritis.

Your children should be aware of when they need to wash their hands with warm water and soap.

This includes:

Before cooking or eating
After using the toilet
After stroking pets and animals
After messy play (such as painting)
After touching dirty items (such as the rubbish bin)
When hands look visibly dirty

Make handwashing fun for your child by singing ‘Happy Birthday’ twice whilst they wash their hands to ensure they are doing it properly and not too quickly.

They should be encouraged to rub their palms together, then rub one palm on the back of the other hand and then swap hands over. Don’t forget to clean the thumb and in-between each finger and wash all the soap suds off in warm (not hot) water.

By encouraging your child to do this from a young age, it forms good habits for the future and helps to keep them healthy too!

Follow the link below to find out more:

How to wash your hands - NHS

https://youtu.be/S9VjeIWLnEg

For further advice and support on handwashing, please contact the Solihull School Nursing Team 0121 726 6754.

Getting a Good Night’s Sleep

Did you know a child attending primary school should be sleeping between 11-12 hours?

It is important for your child’s health and wellbeing to get a good night’s sleep. Sleep is vital to aid development, however; some children do struggle to fall asleep or sleep through the night. Below are some handy tips to aid a good night’s sleep:

Keep the bedroom dark, if lighting is required ensure lights are dimmed
Avoid having screens in the bedroom
Avoid using screens at least one hour before bedtime
Keep a regular sleep routine as well as a rising routine
A warm bath before bedtime will help your child relax

Follow the links below for further help and advice:

Sleep and young children - NHS

inourplace | Solihull Approach – Solihull Approach to sleep

Children - The Sleep Charity

Teenage sleep advice

School Nurses are aware of the increasing numbers of tired young people in school and want to help and support the young people within Solihull.

What is sleep all about?

Hormones and light are ultimately responsible for our sleep patterns, and with all the changes occurring in teenagers it is crucial you get your required amount of sleep.

Recent evidence shows, increased pressures at school and social life, social media, mobile phones and electronic devices being used till late at night is having an impact on the quality of sleep and ultimately resulting in feeling tired. Lack of sleep also affects your education, as it can leave you too tired to concentrate in class and perform to your best ability in exams.

On average a teenager requires a minimum of 8-9 hours per night, good nighttime habits and routine is important to achieving a healthy night’s sleep. Melatonin is the hormone responsible for helping us to sleep and in many young people this is not being released early enough in the evening due to the use of tablets and electronic devices, hence delaying sleep. This would not be a problem if it wasn’t for the need to get up early to get to school on time. However, at weekends young people are having a marathon lie-in to ‘catch-up’ on sleep and this further adds to disturbing the natural body clock.

Teenagers need to stop using mobile phones, tablets or other electronic devices and games consoles at least an hour before they need to go to sleep this will allow the brain time to ‘wind down’ effectively and not be stimulated by ‘blue light’ which delays the production of melatonin levels and the ability to sleep.

Having a routine is important too. A bedtime must be established and an alarm set for an appropriate time in the morning to ensure a restful night’s sleep.

Therefore, to get better sleep teenagers should:

Limit screen usage in their bedroom
Establish a nighttime routine
Avoid caffeine (particularly in the evening)
Exercise for approximately 60 minutes per day
Stop ‘binge’ eating and establish healthy eating habits
Ensure the bedroom is dark, cool and quiet
Talk through any problems to prevent worry and stress
Avoid long weekend lie-ins (as this alters natural body clock)

Overall, a better night’s sleep will assist in improved concentration in school and improved health and wellbeing. For further help and support see the link below:

Home - Teen Sleep Hub

For further advice and support on sleep, please contact the Solihull School Nursing Team 0121 726 6754.

Healthy Lifestyle

School-aged children need about 60 minutes of physical activity a day for good health.

Activity does not need to be all at once, it can be spread throughout the day. It could include riding a bike, skateboarding, walking to school, skipping, swimming, dancing and martial arts.

Activities should make children breathe faster and feel warmer.

Walking or cycling short distances instead of using the car or bus is a great way to be active together as a family. And you'll save money, too.

Further help and advice can be found following the links below:

Find out about physical activity guidelines for children and young people aged 5 to 18

Healthier Families - Home - NHS

Eat a healthy balanced diet

Children, just like adults, should aim to eat 5 or more portions of a variety of fruit and vegetables every day. They're a great source of fibre and vitamins and minerals.

Getting 5 A Day should not be too difficult. Almost all fruit and vegetables count towards your child's 5 A Day, including fresh, tinned, frozen and dried.

Juices, smoothies, beans and pulses also count.

Be aware that unsweetened 100% fruit juice, vegetable juice and smoothies only count as a maximum of 1 portion of their 5 A Day. For example, if they have 2 glasses of fruit juice and a smoothie in 1 day, that still only counts as 1 portion.

Their combined total of drinks from fruit juice, vegetable juice and smoothies should not be more than 150ml a day, which is a small glass.

If they have 150ml of orange juice and a 150ml smoothie in 1 day, for example, they'll have exceeded the recommendation by 150ml.

When fruit is blended or juiced, it releases the sugars.

This increases the risk of tooth decay, so it's best to drink fruit juice or smoothies at mealtimes.

Discourage your child from having sugary or high-fat foods like sweets, cakes, biscuits, crisps, chocolate, some sugary cereals, and sugar-sweetened soft and fizzy drinks. These foods and drinks tend to be high in calories.

Aim for your child to get most of their calories from foods like fruit and vegetables, and starchy foods like bread, potatoes, pasta and rice (preferably wholegrain versions).

They should also have some beans, pulses, fish, eggs, meat and other protein foods, and some dairy or dairy alternatives.

And swap sugary soft drinks, juice and flavoured milks for water, lower-fat milks and diet, sugar-free or no added sugar drinks.

Find out more about healthier food swaps on the Better Health website

There's very little official guidance on precisely how much food children require, so you'll need to use your own judgement on child-size portions.

A good rule of thumb is to start meals with small servings and let your child ask for more if they're still hungry.

Avoid making your child finish everything on the plate or eat more than they want to.

Use smaller plates for younger children, as adult-size plates could encourage them to eat oversized portions.

It may also help if you encourage your child to eat slowly and have set mealtimes. You can use mealtimes as an opportunity to catch up on what's happened during the day.

Explain to your child how to get the balance of their diet right using the Eatwell Guide. It shows how much we should all eat from each food group.

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