Nursery World - Case study: Harriet Harris

'This is quite a young profession,' says Harriet Harris, a hospital play specialist at the Royal Alexandra Hospital for Sick Children, Brighton, which is part of the Brighton and Sussex Universities Hospitals Trust. 'It is exciting to be part of a profession that is reaching its adolescence and growing and developing all the time. 'It is lovely to be able to make a situation which could be frightening and very stressful for a child into something that the child knows is going to be fun. To know you have helped a child get through that experience is so rewarding.'

'It is lovely to be able to make a situation which could be frightening and very stressful for a child into something that the child knows is going to be fun. To know you have helped a child get through that experience is so rewarding.'

Ms Harris points out that like many caring professions, hospital play work is not particularly well paid, but she benefits from being in the NHS pension scheme.

'I am based now on the day surgery unit but I can go to other wards in the hospital when I am needed. Most children come in for a pre-admission visit the week before and I prepare them for what is going to happen the following week. So when they come back, I am a familiar face and I can remind them about what is going to happen.

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