McKenzie, 15, who has spina bifida, has been in and out of hospital throughout his life. He was a youth advisor to the taskforce which helped create the newly launched Toolkit for children’s play in healthcare, which we have co-produced with NHS England.
(McKenzie is part of the Welsh National para swimming squad - currently holds 5 men’s records for his classification. He's also part of Welsh U18 national wheelchair tennis squad!)
Because of my disabilities, I have spent a lot of time in hospital. This is when I first met play specialists. They really helped me as I was in hospital for a long time and they gave me something to look forward to each day.
The play specialists did more than just play. They prepared me for operations and procedures.
I was distracted from stressful procedures by them being there to have fun.
They gave me someone to talk to and I trusted them. It was nice to have some time away from my parents which was GREAT!!
One story I will always remember is when I was in hospital for Christmas. One of the presents I was given was a NERF gun - this was probably a mistake on their part!!
This meant I was able to terrorise every nurse on the ward until I was given some new fun targets.
These targets consisted of cups and the play specialists helped me by printing photos of my least favourite consultants. We then stapled these onto the cups, so I could shoot them. I would really enjoy doing this during ward rounds so they could watch their heads fall to the floor!
This may have also helped with some anger management!
Being able to have these funny memories would mean that the next inevitable visit to hospital would not be filled with as much worry and fear.
The downside was at weekends. I really struggled with them not being there to help with cannulas or to come to theatre with me.
Between 2022 and 2024, I was part of NHS England Children and Young People’s Youth Board. This gave me an opportunity to have a voice and feed into national policies. As part of my application for the role, I spoke about play specialists because it was one of the areas I wanted to change and have my say about.
I was also very excited to be involved with the working group looking at standards of play in health care. (Photo: McKenzie pictured flushing out his own cannula with support from health play specialist Demi and his mum Kerry)
My main aim was for seven day a week play provision for all children. Treatment and procedures do not stop at the weekends - so why should play? A huge thank you to Starlight and everyone else who has helped to produce the standards and guidelines.