Do No Harm
First, do no harm. These words are part of the medical Hippocratic oath that underpins the ethics in the health care sector. As a mission statement the social care sector could do well to adopt this in their approach to the care given to looked after children.
All too often the system fails the children it is supposed to care for in some of the following ways; persisting with foster care arrangements long after the threshold for a residential placement has been met - leading to multiple placement breakdowns, poor decision making in choosing residential placements that meet the specific needs of that child, poor information sharing that restricts a providers ability to adequately assess risk and the impact of placement, short term thinking and planning that lead to immediate or emergency solutions to problems without addressing the route cause or giving enough time to plan.
Poor decision making in transitioning children out of residential care – either leaving too soon or going to an unsuitable provision.
A child in residential care is likely to have experienced at least one if not all of these scenarios, given that they have been taken into care to protect them from trauma, abuse and neglect and should be supported to heal from these, the fact the system itself inflicts further failings on these vulnerable children is something we all must resolve ourselves to correct and improve.
Woodford strive to engage with all partners involved in the commissioning, delivery and oversight of residential care to work together to identify the issues, learn lessons and build a system that is fit for purpose and delivers safe, calm and reliable environments where traumatised children can begin to build trusting relationships over a long-term placement and begin to process the feelings they have from their early childhood experiences.