New free RCPCH Modules: Supporting Paediatricians in Managing Familial Hypercholesterolaemia in Children

The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH) announce two new online modules, available for free, to address a growing need for Paediatricians and related Healthcare Professionals to better understand how to identify and manage children and young people with Heterozygous Familial Hypercholesterolaemia (HeFH).

Prof Steve Humphries, and Dr Uma Ramaswami, of the EAS Paediatric FH Working Group, together with Dr Neil Hopper, have developed these training modules in response to the urgent need for improved identification and management of HeFH in children and young people.

“Based on the prevalence of FH in the general population of ~1/288, we estimate that in the EU there are likely to be ~280,000 Children and Young People (C&YP) with HeFH, with ~212,000 children with HeFH in the USA. 

Survey data suggests that fewer than 10% of these children are currently known and being managed in adult and paediatric centres. With many International and country guidelines recommending Universal Screening approaches to find children with HeFH,  the number of identified children will hopefully increase several fold over the next few years. 

To provide services for this number of individuals, current provision will need to be expanded considerably, as will the number of Health Care Professionals with expertise in managing paediatric FH.”

The modules are available for free from the RCPCH website.