Visiting The Royal Children's Hospital

The Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH) is committed to ensuring the safety, security and privacy of the children and young people we care for, as well as families, carers and staff. We want to ensure the RCH is a safe place for everyone.

From Saturday 25 March 2023, visitors (including parents) will no longer need to check in at Main Street Reception before entering the hospital.

Access to inpatient wards will be by security access pass only, ensuring only those people with prior approval or authorisation (such as parents) have access to patients, families, carers and staff.

Please remember that while you are at the RCH you must wear a mask at all times, except when in a patient room. We ask that you always wear a mask properly (the mask should cover your nose and fit under your chin) whenever an RCH staff member enters a patient’s room – and please do not ever visit if you are unwell.

Information for parents, carers and guardians

We respect your right as a parent or carer to determine who should visit your child, and when. So, while your child is an inpatient at the RCH, we ask that you help keep them and others safe in the following ways:

• If you are expecting visitors, please advise those visitors of your child’s ward and room number before they arrive.
• Please keep visitors to a minimum whenever possible to minimise disruption on the ward. There may also be times when visitors are asked to leave your child’s room during a consultation or when we need to provide care. Please respect any RCH staff directions.
• Parents and carers will be provided with an access pass on a clearly marked visitor lanyard to use during your child’s inpatient stay. Please ensure you wear your lanyard and access pass at all times as this will allow you 24/7 access to your child’s ward and after-hours access to the lifts. We will provide each family with up to two passes.
• If you are expecting visitors, please ask your visitors to make contact with you prior to their arrival and plan to meet them at the front of the ward. You can use your access pass to enter.

Information for visitors

• As we have an obligation to ensure that patient information is kept private and confidential, we're not permitted to disclose any information about a patient to anyone other than a child's parent or legal guardian.
• This means we cannot confirm:
  • if a child is an inpatient or receiving care at the RCH
  • which ward they are on
  • how they are recovering
  • if they have been discharged.
• If you want to visit a child, please contact their parent or guardian to obtain permission first. They can advise you of an appropriate time to visit and the child's ward and room number.
• Please arrange to meet the child's family outside of the ward at an agreed time and they will be able to let you in. 
• If you want to send a delivery to a child who is an inpatient, please organise this with the family and ensure they can be present to meet any delivery people at Main Street Reception.
• Courier and delivery drivers will be advised to contact the family directly to organise collection.

COVID-19 safety

Please keep the safety of all our patients and staff in mind during your visit.

When visiting the RCH you will need to sanitise your hands and wear a surgical or N95 mask (that covers your chin and nose). We provide hand sanitiser and masks for visitors.

If you have any symptoms of COVID-19, please stay home and do not visit the hospital.

Visit our  COVID-19 section for RCH information and resources in English and other languages.