The Parent Role in Advocating for a Deteriorating Child: A Qualitative Study.

Background And Objectives: Families of children with medical complexity are experts on their child's baseline behavior and temperament and may recognize changes in their hospitalized child's health before clinicians. Our objective was to develop a comprehensive understanding of how families identify and communicate their child's deteriorating health with the hospital-based health care team.

Methods: In this qualitative study, our multidisciplinary team recruited family members of hospitalized children with neurologic impairment.

Urine neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin in girls with recurrent urinary tract infections.

Background: Children who experience more than one urinary tract infection (UTI) are at increased risk of kidney scarring due to their UTIs. Girls are at especially high risk for developing kidney scarring as a result of recurrent UTIs. Prior work suggested that neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin (NGAL) may be lower in children with recurrent UTI compared with those without.

A Qualitative Study of Increased Pediatric Reutilization After a Postdischarge Home Nurse Visit.

Background: The Hospital to Home Outcomes (H2O) trial was a 2-arm, randomized controlled trial that assessed the effects of a nurse home visit after a pediatric hospital discharge. Children randomized to the intervention had higher 30-day postdischarge reutilization rates compared with those with standard discharge. We sought to understand perspectives on why postdischarge home nurse visits resulted in higher reutilization rates and to elicit suggestions on how to improve future interventions.

Nurse Responses to Physiologic Monitor Alarms on a General Pediatric Unit.

Background: Hospitalized children generate up to 152 alarms per patient per day outside of the intensive care unit. In that setting, as few as 1% of alarms are clinically important. How nurses make decisions about responding to alarms, given an alarm's low specificity for detecting clinical deterioration, remains unclear.

Factors Influencing Use of Continuous Physiologic Monitors for Hospitalized Pediatric Patients.

Objectives: Continuous physiologic monitors (CPMs) generate frequent alarms and are used for up to 50% of children who are hospitalized outside of the ICU. Our objective was to assess factors that influence the decision to use CPMs.

Methods: In this qualitative study, we used group-level assessment, a structured method designed to engage diverse stakeholder groups.