Authoritative, evidence-based guidance about the most effective ways to deliver preventive services. Designed to accompany the Bright Futures Guidelines for Health Supervision of Infants, Children, and Adolescents, Third Edition, this manual provides authoritative, evidence-based guidance about the most effective ways to deliver preventive services. Ideal for pediatric practice professionals, and as a teaching tool for medical students, residents, and all health professionals who provide well child care. Nationally renowned experts reviewed the scientific medical literature and authored the content which is organized into 4 main sections: History, Observation, and Surveillance / Physical Exam / Screening / Anticipatory Guidance.

"This essential resource provides key background information and recommendations for 12 health promotion themes, including 3 brand-new topics : promoting lifelong health for families and communities, promoting health for children and youth with special health care needs, and promoting the healthy and safe use of social media. Also included in this essential resource are well-child supervision standards for 31 age-based visits, from newborn through 21 years. The result : more efficient visits, stronger partnerships with children and families, and enhanced ability to keep up with changes in family, communities, and society that affect a child's health."--Page 4 de la couverture.

Presents physical activity guidelines and tools emphasizing health promotion, disease prevention, and early recognition of physical activity issues and concerns of infants, children, and adolescents. Designed for use by physicians, nurses, dietitians, and health educators to screen and assess the physical activity levels of infants, children, and adolescents and to provide anticipatory guidance on physical activity to families.

America's Children is a comprehensive, easy-to-read analysis of the relationship between health insurance and access to care. The book addresses three broad questions: How is children's health care currently financed? Does insurance equal access to care? How should the nation address the health needs of this vulnerable population? America's Children explores the changing role of Medicaid under managed care; state-initiated and private sector children's insurance programs; specific effects of insurance status on the care children receive; and the impact of chronic medical conditions and special health care needs. It also examines the status of "safety net" health providers, including community health centers, children's hospitals, school-based health centers, and others and reviews the changing patterns of coverage and tax policy options to increase coverage of private-sector, employer-based health insurance. In response to growing public concerns about uninsured children, last year Congress voted to provide $24 billion over five years for new state insurance initiatives. This volume will serve as a primer for concerned federal policymakers and regulators, state agency officials, health plan decisionmakers, health care providers, children's health advocates, and researchers.

Well child care is designed to promote optimal health status for children, including school and life success. This preventive care includes anticipatory guidance; continuity of care; assessment of growth and development; screening procedures for vision, hearing, dental, and cognitive development; and immunizations. Anticipatory guidance provides parental health education, counseling, and reassurance. The vast majority of Medicaid-insured children receive fewer than the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommended number of well child visits in the preschool years, and a disproportionate number of children have poor health and lack school readiness. With little empirical data available indicating clinical effectiveness other than for immunizations, the AAP recommendations for well child care were originally based on consensus expert opinion, and more than three decades later, documentation of effectiveness remained unavailable. This information gap led policymakers to question the value of well child care and limited incentive to correct its underuse. Only in the last five years have experimental findings indicated an association between well child care and both more cost efficient health care and increased school readiness. Awareness of these findings by insurance company and Medicaid administrators is limited. The purpose for this book is to increase awareness by all stakeholders of the empirically determined clinical effectiveness of well child care. The short-term goal is to facilitate increased utilization of well child care, with a longer term goal of improved child health and life success.

In light of recent efforts in the United States to advance some type of universal health care package for all citizens, including preventive services for children, this report examines how other countries with universal health insurance provide preventive care to children, and what, if any, are the implications for reform efforts in the United States. Child health services in England, France, Germany, Japan, and the Netherlands are reviewed. The first portion of the document describes the scope and background of the study, as well as summary results, noting that although the five study countries provide universal access to preventive health care for all children, they do not rely solely on systems of universal coverage to ensure that all children receive services. Instead, these countries take one or more of the following actions to help secure this outcome: (1) notifying health authorities of new births; (2) targeting new parents for home visits; (3) providing convenient access to physical exams and immunizations; and (4) facilitating the continuity of care through the use of computerized tracking systems. Five appendixes make up the remainder of the document, outlining these nations' systematic approach to delivering preventive care, outreach activities that promote preventive care and remind parents of services, tracking systems that help ensure children receive services, and laws and regulations that provide entitlement to preventive care. A list of major contributors to the report makes up the fifth appendix.

An invaluable, structured approach to the preventive care of children with congenital disorders.

This report examines the condition of children in 10 European countries (Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Switzerland and the United Kingdom) where infant survival rates are better than the U.S. and where they all share elements of pluralism in their systems of health care.