Launch of early years toolkit for allied health professionals

Published 09/10/2023

The Early Years Prevention Toolkit has been created to support Allied Health Professionals (AHP) to tackle health inequalities for our future generations.

This toolkit is for AHPs working with young people aged 0-7 years. It may also be applicable more widely, including for people who work with young persons, expectant mothers or families. The contents are suitable for use at every career level, including students, new starters, experienced practitioners and team/organisational leads. It aims to help AHPs identify and maximise ways to improve health and tackle health inequalities as individuals and teams.

Health and care inequalities across Wales and the UK are increasing and have been made worse by the pandemic and associated challenges. Health inequalities are described as ‘unfair and avoidable differences in health across populations and different groups within society’ (The King’s Fund, 2022). Social, environmental and economic inequalities damage the health and wellbeing of our communities.

Allied Health Professionals (AHPs) have an important part to play in addressing health inequalities. To help achieve a healthier, fairer society we need to take a life course approach with a focus on early years. This gives every child the best start in life and ensures their needs and rights are met. Disadvantage can start before birth and accumulate over the life-course. Working in early years, we all have a place to make small changes to raise awareness, take action and advocate for reducing health inequalities. This can have a positive impact on the health of the next generation (The King’s Fund, 2021).

The crucial importance of investing in our future generation is highlighted in the Build Back Fairer Report (Marmot, 2020):

Early childhood is a critical time for development of later life outcomes, including health. Evidence shows that positive experiences early in life are closely associated with better performance at school, better social and emotional development, improved work outcomes, higher income and better lifelong health, including longer life expectancy.

Conversely, less positive experiences early in life, particularly experiences of adversity, relate closely to many negative long-term outcomes: poverty, unemployment, homelessness, unhealthy behaviours and poor mental and physical health.

The toolkit has been designed with a focus on Wales. However, much of the content will be relevant across the UK: please refer to your national policy where relevant. It builds on commitments in the UK AHP Public Health Strategic Framework 2019-2024. pdf (ahpf.org.uk). This toolkit uses the guiding principles set out in the My role in tackling health inequalities: a framework for allied health professionals | The King’s Fund (kingsfund.org.uk) with a focus on early years. The framework looks at six aspects of practice which we can consider in relation to our own unique role in tackling health inequalities.

Whatever our role, we can make a difference in tackling health inequalities and improving the health of our population. Starting with our youngest generation will build for the future. This could be raising our own awareness and that of colleagues, having a conversation about addressing the wider determinants of health. This could also be speaking up in a meeting, influencing the design of services or advocating for wider changes. Remember, every little helps.