School Nursing and Obesity - Beyond the National Child Measurement Programme (NCMP)

In 2011 the Trafford division of Bridgewater Community Healthcare Trust developed a project aimed at enhancing the School Nursing service delivery of the National Child Measurement Programme (NCMP). The NCMP involves local areas collecting data on the height and weight of children in English schools in Reception Year and Year 6 to enable the Government to monitor obesity trends (DHOT, 2012). Feedback letters about individual children are sent out to all parents.The School Nursing service carries out the measurements on children each year and inputs the results for return to the Department of Health. School nurses are also the named contact point for parents to ask for advice and support, although it became apparent in 2011 that relatively few parents were responding to the letters, and if they did it was often to complain about the letter as a mechanism for advising them that their child was overweight.