• Pediatric emergency care · Feb 1996

    Comparative Study

    Child life programs in the pediatric emergency department.

    • M S Krebel, C Clayton, and C Graham.
    • Department of Pediatrics, University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, Little Rock, USA.
    • Pediatr Emerg Care. 1996 Feb 1; 12 (1): 13-5.

    AbstractChild life (CL) programs have long been utilized in the inpatient setting to help in relieving the stress and anxiety associated with hospitalization. The objective of this study was to determine the current availability of such programs in pediatric emergency departments (ED) and what interventions were provided in one ED with a CL program. We conducted a telephone survey of EDs in 44 large children's hospitals in the United States as to their use of child life specialists (CLS). Also, a retrospective review was performed of the CL intervention in one large pediatric ED over a two-year period. Only 6/44 EDs (14%) had at least one full-time CLS, with three of those having two full-time workers. In these EDs the CLS prepared children for painful or anxiety-provoking procedures and provided developmentally appropriate activities in the ED. Another 6/44 (14%) had CL services available by consult. There were no CLS available in 32/44 (72%) EDs, where nursing staff prepared children for painful procedures. EDs with a higher census were more likely to have a full-time CLS (P = 0.02). Hospitals with certified pediatric trauma centers were less likely to have any CL services available in the ED (P = 0.04). A review of the records of the ED at Arkansas Children's Hospital revealed that 32% of patient contacts by the CLS were for invasive procedure teaching and support. Another 22% of interventions were for developmental stimulation. Family support (21.5%) and therapeutic intervention (17.5%) were the next most common contacts. Admission teaching accounted for 4%, while preoperative teaching and support accounted for only 3% of the total. There were more patient contacts made by the worker on evening shift. CL programs, while common in the inpatient setting, are currently underutilized in most pediatric EDs. CLS can provide a variety of services in the pediatric ED.

      Pubmed     Copy Citation     Plaintext  

      Add institutional full text...

    Notes

     
    Knowledge, pearl, summary or comment to share?
    300 characters remaining
    help        
    You can also include formatting, links, images and footnotes in your notes
    • Simple formatting can be added to notes, such as *italics*, _underline_ or **bold**.
    • Superscript can be denoted by <sup>text</sup> and subscript <sub>text</sub>.
    • Numbered or bulleted lists can be created using either numbered lines 1. 2. 3., hyphens - or asterisks *.
    • Links can be included with: [my link to pubmed](http://pubmed.com)
    • Images can be included with: ![alt text](https://bestmedicaljournal.com/study_graph.jpg "Image Title Text")
    • For footnotes use [^1](This is a footnote.) inline.
    • Or use an inline reference [^1] to refer to a longer footnote elseweher in the document [^1]: This is a long footnote..

    hide…

What will the 'Medical Journal of You' look like?

Start your free 21 day trial now.

We guarantee your privacy. Your email address will not be shared.