Long COVID-19 in children: How to support families

Parent and founder of the group LongCovidKids, Fran Simpson, will be presenting the lived experience of families whose children have Long COVID, including symptoms that children are suffering from and best practice for working with these families from the perspectives of the families themselves and supportive practitioners and researchers.

As the toll of Long COVID grows ever larger, we are increasingly becoming aware of its impact on children and their families, and we will potentially be dealing with the psychological fallout from this for many years to come. This webinar is run by a parent and founder of the group LongCovidKids, Fran Simpson, who has been experiencing this and sharing her findings since late 2020. She will be presenting the lived experience of families, including the range of symptoms that children are suffering from and the responses from the medical professionals. She will also look at best practices for working with these families, from the perspectives of the families themselves, as well as supportive practitioners and researchers that have been involved in this developing situation.

This webinar will provide practitioners with an overview of Long COVID in children – what we know so far (and what we don’t), what may support people (and what really won’t!) using the most current empirical evidence. It will provide some examples of real life situations and feedback from the lived experience of members of LongCovidKids. It will explore the difficulties of living with the associated uncertainties and consider ways in which this may be addressed. It will briefly touch on the need for practitioners to be client centred, and validate the lived experiences and knowledge of the families with care taken not to reduce the condition.