Sophie and Angela are the Clinical Nurse Specialists for children and young adults with IBD at The Royal London Hospital. The patient cohort is children diagnosed in childhood through adolescence and into early adult years (22 years).

 

Sophie joined the IBD team almost two years ago and brings a wealth of experience from paediatric gastrointestinal nursing, A&E, and the paediatric assessment unit. Angela rejoined the IBD team a year ago, having previously been part of the IBD nursing team earlier in her career, while also gaining extensive experience in clinical nutrition.

 

Both Angela and Sophie are passionate about ensuring that children and young people have a positive experience's within paediatric services, helping to shape their pathway for future care. They provide education, support and counselling for children, young people and families living with IBD. This includes helping patients understand their condition, recognise symptoms, supporting treatment decisions  and promoting self management. Therapeutic drug counselling involves supporting families and patients to understand the medications. They play a key role in working within the multi disciplinary team to ensure young people and familiesfeel informed and supported in managing their IBD and therapy safely and effectively.

 

Together, Sophie and Angela play a pivotal role in supporting the transition of young people with IBD from children’s to adult services. Since working in partnership, they have developed a range of patient information resources focused on transition. These resources were reviewed during patient engagement events and are due to be released shortly.

 

A key aspect of the transition pathway is disease education and medication management. Angela and Sophie recently had a poster accepted at European Society for Paediatric Gastroenterology Hepatology and Nutrition (ESPGHAN) describing the transition from intravenous infliximab to subcutaneous injections, including patient teaching, monitoring, drug levels, efficacy, and compliance.

 

Angela and Sophie are excited about future projects aimed at improving care and enhancing patient pathways for children and young people with IBD.