CHILDRENS HEALTH

Schoolarts

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Once your child is four, he will be blissfully free of clinic appointments and vaccinations for some time. Administration of preventative healthcare moves now from the consultatiebureau on to the schoolarts - school doctor - system (although still administered by the GGD) and communication will largely be via the school.

After the frequent visits of care up to age four, it completely slackens off for the next eight years. Your child will be seen by the schoolarts in Group 2 and Group 7 of the basisschool (primary school, ages 4 to 12) only; at special schools these ages may be different, consult the school in question. The role of the GGD remains just the same as your child grows older, in that it aims to monitor the children's development, maintain preventative healthcare and stimulate a healthy lifestyle, and the approach changes only slightly as your child grows older.

As at younger ages, you are of course still encouraged to contact the GGD or your huisarts if you have concerns about any aspect of your child's development. There is a new one-stop-shop for children's health and wellbeing, the Centrum Jeugd en Gezin , Centre for Children and Families, designed to make all kinds of (physical and mental) healthcare more accessible, and at www.jeugdengezin.nl you can find out more (in Dutch). The Leiden centre is in the Stevenshof health centre ( www.gcstevenshof.nl , Theda Mansholtstraat 3, 2331 JE).

Group 2 check

This is very like the peuter appointments at the clinic. Your child's hearing and sight are checked; she is measured and weighed, and some simple tests of gross and fine motor skills (walking a straight line; drawing shapes) are carried out. You are given a questionnaire to fill in beforehand, and the chance to talk any worries over with the doctor. They do keep an eye out for things like dyslexia, but remember that the onus remains on you as the parent to raise matters of concern. Having said this, your child's school can also suggest that something might be wrong, which the schoolarts can then look in to with particular care. In my experience the schoolarts can also be an invaluable ally in reporting back to school that a child does in fact not have a problem when the school suggests that she does!

Discussions may be partly without the child present, which can be very useful at times.... If it is necessary and if you give your consent, information relevant to the child's school performance will be discussed with her teacher; this confidentiality is maintained at all ages.

Group 7 check

At this age it is even more hands-off than before; children in Leiden are weighed and measured by a medical assistente at school, and as in group 2 there will be a questionnaire beforehand for parents and a check-up appointment.

Preventative side