Virtual appointments

Telephone and video appointments

You may be invited to have your child’s next outpatient appointment over the phone or a video call.

This aims to save you time and money, as you will not need to travel to our hospital or a community site. It may also benefit you if you find it difficult to travel, or if you feel more comfortable talking about your child's health in your own home. It also means less time off school and work.

Your child may need to have investigations done locally to you prior to the appointment, for example blood tests or height and weight measurements. We will let you know in advance if we need you to do this and how to go about it.

After your appointment, the clinician may refer your child for tests which might mean you need to attend the hospital for further investigations or an examination in person. The clinician will advise you at your appointment and will make sure your GP is informed.

Accessing our telephone clinics

If you are booked for a telephone appointment, you will receive a letter/email and a text message confirming the details, including the date and time. If your appointment is made at short notice, you may not receive a letter but the team will ensure you have all the details you need in advance.

Please help us by ensuring we have the correct telephone number for you. This will be the number you receive text message confirmations on and/or the number detailed in your child's appointment letter. If you need to update your details, please contact the department in advance of your telephone appointment.

There are two ways you may be able to access a telephone clinic appointment:

Pre-arranged date and time for a clinician to call you. You will receive details of the appointment via text message and appointment letter as detailed above.
Via the patient online booking (Zesty). A list of services that offer this for patients is below. You will be provided the link to book a telephone consultation by the service.

Complex childhood and young adult neuro disability
Dermatology
Paediatric musculoskeletal
Paediatric neuromuscular disorder
Paediatric orthotics
Paediatric rare bone diseases therapy service
Paediatric rheumatology
Paediatric allergy
Pharmacy medicines

Telephone calls may be from our Trust number (020 7188 9613) or the number used to call may be withheld. Please note you are unable to return calls to this number.

If you miss the call, the clinician will move onto the next patient and then try to call you again at a later time. If you were unable to answer and/or do not receive a call within one hour of your appointment time, please contact the department number on your clinic letter.

Occasionally, there might be a short delay and your appointment might not run at the planned time. This may be because our clinician needs to spend a little longer with another patient.

Accessing our video clinics

If a video appointment has been booked for your child, you will receive a letter/email and a text message confirming the details including the date, time and the link to access the virtual waiting room. If your appointment is made at short notice, you may not receive a letter but the team will ensure you have all the details you need in advance.

Follow these steps to join:

Open the link to your video appointment in Google Chrome if you have an android phone or computer, or in Apple Safari if you have an iPhone or Apple device.
Enter your child's first name, last name, date of birth and phone number. This information will help us to identify you
Click ‘submit’ to proceed. Once signed in, please wait for our clinician to greet you and your child.

Occasionally, there might be a short delay and your appointment might not run at the planned time. This may be because our clinician needs to spend a little longer with another patient. When this happens, the consultant will aim to send you a message via the application to let you know.

If this is your first time attending a video appointment, we recommend that you check and test your equipment, including your webcam, mic and speaker in advance. Please join the virtual waiting room 15 minutes before you appointment to allow time for this. You can practice joining the virtual waiting room at any time. Please note that you can only do this if you have a pre-booked video appointment with your clinician.

To ensure the call is of good quality please try to complete it over WiFi wherever possible.

Your appointment might be held using software called Attend
Anywhere®. No part of the Attend Anywhere® online video consultation will be recorded or permanently stored and you must not record your consultation. If for any reason the clinician wishes to record any part of your appointment, you will be asked for permission in advance.