A Personal Child Health Record or PCHR is a form of personal health record that records a child's growth, development, and use of health services.
Contents
Paper-based record
The paper based child health record as used by the National Health Service of the United Kingdom is popularly known as the "Red Book." It is given to the parents on or just after the birth of their child, and is used by parents to record standard health details such as height and weight as well as developmental milestones such as first words and first time walking. As the record has matured, additional information has been added in the form of inserts to aid parents with certain medical conditions, such as Down syndrome. There are also sections that are typically completed by the child's GP or health visitor.
There are also additional updates from organisations such as the World Health Organization for growth chart updates
The Scottish National Personal Child Health Record is available for download if you have a child born before January 2010. The UK-WHO Growth Charts are also available for download. EEPDwiki has links to more resources and examples of UK hand-held child health records.
A number of other countries have similar paper-based systems for sharing information between health professionals and parents. The Japanese introduced a maternal and child paper record (Boshi techo) in 1947 with the aim of reducing perinatal mortality. The current form of Mother Child Health Handbook (Boshi kenko techo) was introduced in 1966 and has been adapted for use in at least 20 countries worldwide.
Electronic record
The online version is being developed by Sitekit www.eredbook.org.uk in partnership with Harlow Printing – who print the current book – and will be hosted by Microsoft’s HealthVault.
An online version was earlier attempted by a Cambridge company called as redbabybook.com. The company is now defunct.
All the information is the same as in the print version, but the online version will do things such as prompting for scheduling appointments, checking test results online or providing links to NHS information.