Karen Cuttell and colleagues describe the setting up and the evaluation of a home care paediatric renal nursing service

A child with a chronic illness can often be a source of tension in family relationships. The daily burden of care necessary to look after children with chronic renal failure at home is borne by family members, especially the mothers (1). Chronic peritoneal dialysis at home is now the favoured treatment of choice for children and, with this technique, the family faces enormous challenges. These include not only the burden of the dialysis, but often gastrostomy or nasogastric feeding, dressings, blood pressure measurements, and administration of medications (2).