Visiting Sheffield Children’s Hospital
Programme Manager, Max, Shares Her Visit to Sheffield Children’s Hospital
Our Health Programme Manager, Max, and former World BMX Champion and Athlete Mentor, Kelvin Batey spent a day at Sheffield Children’s Hospital meeting young people, the healthcare teams, and sharing information about our One-to-One Mentoring Programme. Max shared her thoughts on the visit with us:
Almost a year on from our initial visit in 2025 to Sheffield Children’s, Kelvin and I were greeted by Tamsin Cruz (Physiotherapist) and Catherine Dunbar (Occupational Therapist) inside the vast, colourful and sunny atrium of the hospital to spend our day meeting with patients as they came in for outpatient clinics or whilst they were up on MDC (Medical Day Care) for treatment.
As always, Kelvin brought his exceptional enthusiasm and energy to the day and was keen to introduce himself and share the details of the programme with the families he met.
We saw patients predominately from rheumatology and pain departments, where some of their appointments can last several hours from having their bloods, weight and height taken, to IV treatment up on MDC before seeing their speciality team so it’s a lot of information to take onboard. Kelvin brought a smile to faces and was a welcome distraction for young people as he shared his experiences and how the one-to-one mentoring programme works.
It’s always very motivating to get to meet the young people, but not without challenges to try to engage young people to understand the way it all works, and importantly the ‘why would I do this, what do I have to do’ questions we inevitably get from most 11-18 year olds! The feedback we get from participants is overwhelmingly positive, with one mum even sending us a request to get their Athlete Mentor an OBE! We want to make sure that as many of those referred to the programme by their specialist have access to this positive experience, but it’s not always an easy process given that the young people and their families are going through an awful lot at the moment they are in hospital. That makes me really focused on looking at how we promote the programme and how young people and their families can access the mentor’s support and the visit to Sheffield Children’s Hospital was a fantastic moment to promote the programme to lots of families.
Sheffield Children’s is one of four hospitals that the programme accepts referrals from, with Great Ormond Street, Alder Hey and St George’s also partnering with Dame Kelly Holmes Trust to provide a innovative approach to supporting patients wellbeing before, during and post hospital care.
The programme at Sheffield Children’s Hospital is funded by Sport England.