Debate contribution: Sensory Room: Royal Belfast Hospital for Sick Children
Debate contribution by Mr Alan Chambers on .
- MLA
- Mr Alan Chambers
- Party at the time
- Ulster Unionist Party
- Date
- 4 November 2025
- Type
- Debate contribution
- Business
- Adjournment
- Heading
- Sensory Room: Royal Belfast Hospital for Sick Children
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 5217212
Read the official Assembly record
Text
I certainly welcome this extremely important debate. I also welcome the broad cross-party recognition of the growing and well-documented value that sensory rooms and sensory pods can bring to healthcare settings. As MLAs, we often have people coming to our constituency offices to relay their experiences of the health service. That includes families who sometimes face the sensory challenge of a busy hospital environment. For any child, hospitals can be a strange and overwhelming environment, but, for children who are neurodiverse or live with sensory processing difficulties, it can be an even greater challenge. Any family with such a child will know how quickly distress can escalate when the environment feels unsafe to them or out of their control. That is why sensory rooms are so important. They provide a breathing space, offer a much better environment for a young person and allow them to receive care with minimised distress. While there is provision for such spaces across the health estate, there is a shortfall at the Royal Belfast Hospital for Sick Children. I know from engaging with the Department on the matter that the Belfast Trust has been seeking to identify the necessary space adjacent to the paediatric emergency department to create a dedicated sensory room in the near future. That is a really positive step. I am hopeful that that shortage in provision can soon be resolved. I beg your indulgence, Mr Deputy Speaker, to highlight a development in Bangor, albeit that it is aimed at a different cohort. The council recently opened a dementia-friendly sensory garden in Ward Park. That has proved to be a calming oasis for dementia patients and their families. The plants have not reached full maturity, but, next year, they will. I certainly welcome that facility.
293 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
Assessment
Awaiting analysis
This record has not been analysed yet. It is not counted in any total until it has been assessed.
Disagree with this assessment?
Classifications can be challenged. A person reviews every challenge, and any change is recorded publicly above with its reason.