APEM Quarterly Update

Happy New Year to you all and we hope you manged to get some rest and recuperation over the holiday period!

December saw us all in the depths of the "flunami" (thank you Ian Lewins) and RSV surge - how are your teams holding up? Its tough out there with increased numbers of attendances and staff sickness, please do reach out if you think there is more APEM can be doing to support or advocate for you and your teams. (BTW - isn't it great that those of us in England can now benchmark ourselves against each other: https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas/ae-waiting-times-and-activity/ae-attendances-and-emergency-admissions-2025-26/).

APEM activity in the Last Quarter

Over the past three months, APEM has continued to deliver fantastic educational events, contibuted as a key stakeholder in several policy & guidance working groups and have begun updating our constitution. Details below:

• Events

We ran our first combined APEM/PERUKI conference in Edinburgh in September. This was a great success with over 100 delegates and a fantastic array of talks - from a great panel looking at systems risk and evidence, focused around the hot, tachycardic child, to non fatal strangulation, paediatric sedation and a call to arms around safer screens for children. We thoroughly enjoyed the day and aligning with our PERUKI friends and hope you did too.

In November, we hosted our "Wins in PEM" study day, delivered by RCEM. We had a diverse range of speakers talking about practical solutions to problems that we all face but perhaps need a bit of innovative inspriation to address. Sessions included the front door (redirection/direct discharge from triage), pandemic preparedness, improved mental health pathways, and health promotion and frequent attender initiatives. We had fantastic audience engagement and feedback. We are working on being able to share resources with our members and will hopefully repeat the day in 2 years time.

We will see you next in the APEM session at the RCPCH conference in May! https://www.rcpch.ac.uk/news-events/rcpch-conference

• National policy and guidance

  We have been invited to be stakeholders in several working groups and will signpost you to resources when they are released:

  • NCEPOD Stabilisation of the critically ill child study advisory group - many of you will be involved in data entry for this in your organisations. The aims are to identify good practice/areas from improvement in the quality of care for children who are critically ill and require stabilistion. Due for publication in December 2026. https://www.ncepod.org.uk/Stabilisation.html

  • Non-fatal strangulation - APEM is part of the working group to look at the evidence and contribute to guidance for children and young people around this important topic, with the Institute for Addressing Strangulation.

  • Enaging with NRAP - who trying to improve time to steroid administration in acute life-threatening asthma

  • Contributed RCPCH guidance including management of respiratory viruses https://www.rcpch.ac.uk/resources/guidance-management-children-viral-respiratory-tract-infections and management of children with acute decreased conscious level (consultation just closed).

  • Engaged with consultation on NICE guideline on diagnosis and management of pneumonia and RCR Major Trauma Imaging Guidance

  • And of course contributed to the Facing the Future - Standards for Children in Emergency Care Settings https://www.rcpch.ac.uk/resources/facing-future-standards-children-young-people-emergency-care-settings

• Committee

Jane Bayreuther stepped down as chair at our September conference. Luckily she has agreed to stay on the commitee as past chair to keep us all in check. Charlotte Clements, our previous secretary, was coerced to take over as chair. Miki Lazner has become our secretary and Neha Jain, our website lead, is on maternity leave (congratulations!).

At our AGM in September, we received agreement from more than 10% of our members to update our constitution and change our status to become an incoproated charity. Work is underway on this with legal advice and we will keep you updated of progress.

Current vacancies on the committee are:

Guidelines lead

Interim website lead

RCPCH trainee representative

RCEM trainee representative

Please do keep a look out for the expressions of interest and get involved!

Upcoming

Looking ahead, we have our 2026 APEM and PERUKI conference preparations underway - save the date!

How Members Can Get Involved

Your participation drives APEM’s success. Here are some ways to stay active and make the most of your membership:

• Attend our events and feedback on what is useful for you.

• Look out for opportunities to join our commitee and get involved.

• Share your ideas and feedback through surveys, forums, and direct communication.

• Connect with others through virtual meetups and networking sessions.

• Contribute content or lead sessions if you have knowledge or experience to share.

• Let us know what you want from APEM

  
  

Engagement at any level strengthens our community and creates more value for everyone.

Final Thoughts on Our Journey Together

Is this helpful? APEM is its members and we want to keep you updated on our activity and get your thoughts and experiences so we can all drive forward improvements and changes that matter to us, our teams and our patients.

Stay connected, stay involved, and let’s keep moving forward together. Your voice matters, and your contributions make a difference.