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Parents of children with special needs lack family-centered care
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Targeted interventions that focus on family-centered care may help to reduce perceived health disparities and communication issues that exist for parents of certain children and their clinicians, according to study results published online.
Sara L. Toomey, MD,of thedivision of general pediatrics, department of medicine, Boston Children’s Hospital, and colleagues published data from a cross-sectional analysis on parental-reported need for family-centered care from the 2007 National Survey for Children’s Health, a nationally representative survey that included 91,642 parents with children aged 0 to 17 years.
Overall, 41% of patents reported that they needed additional care coordination for their child. Of those, 31% said their children had unmet care coordination needs.
Parents of children with special health care needs or who were black or Latino were more likely to report “unmet care coordination needs” vs. other parents (P<.001). The researchers said parents whose children saw a personal provider were less likely to report unmet care coordination needs; however, they were just as likely to report disparities in health care.
The researchers noted some limitations; specifically, that the data were derived from parental report and, thus, subject to bias.
Disclosure: Toomey is supported by a Boston Children’s Hospital Career Development Fellowship.
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