Exploring a hospital's response to children who have no fixed address.

OBJECTIVE

To explore how a tertiary metropolitan public healthcare provider supported children who presented with 'no fixed address' (NFA).

METHODS

A retrospective data mining of the electronic medical records of patients with an NFA classification, over 12 months period.

RESULTS

Data mining identified 475 NFA patients, 6% were children. Of the children with NFA, 96% attended the ED only; 10% were referred internally for psychosocial support; 34% had existing psychosocial services; 69% had no recorded discharge location; and 48% self-discharged prior to assessment.

CONCLUSION

The hospital system did not effectively identify or respond to the psychosocial needs of children with NFA.