Call to Action: Screening and Addressing Caregiver Mental Health Needs within all Pediatric Medical Subspecialty Settings as Standard of Care.

Objective: The objective of this topical review is to provide rationale for the development of standards of care to address the mental health needs of caregivers of youth with chronic and acute conditions.

Methods: In this topical review, we describe the relationship between pediatric medical conditions and caregiver mental health, the state of available screening and intervention options, standards of care in medicine, existing caregiver mental health standards in pediatric subspecialty populations, and exemplar caregiver mental health programs that were developed in response to standards. Finally, we will describe our rationale for this standard of care, provide a call to action, and describe anticipated challenges in developing and implementing such standards.

But parents need help! Pathways to caregiver mental health care in pediatric hospital settings.

Objectives: Research and clinical expertise have emphasized the mental health needs of parents and caregivers of medically complex children. Evidence-based interventions are available for adult mental health, including those designed specifically for caregivers caring for children with a variety of health-care needs. This paper describes practical and legal considerations of 3 possible pathways for psychologists to address the needs of caregivers within pediatric hospital settings.

Anxiety Among Adolescent Survivors of Pediatric Cancer.

Purpose: The purpose of this review was to synthesize current knowledge about anxiety among adolescent survivors of pediatric cancer and highlights areas for future research.

Methods: Systematic literature searches were conducted in five databases for articles published anytime before December 28, 2015. Manuscripts were reviewed by a team of six coders.

Profiles of Executive Function Across Children with Distinct Brain Disorders: Traumatic Brain Injury, Stroke, and Brain Tumor.

Objectives: This study examined whether children with distinct brain disorders show different profiles of strengths and weaknesses in executive functions, and differ from children without brain disorder.

Methods: Participants were children with traumatic brain injury (N=82; 8-13 years of age), arterial ischemic stroke (N=36; 6-16 years of age), and brain tumor (N=74; 9-18 years of age), each with a corresponding matched comparison group consisting of children with orthopedic injury (N=61), asthma (N=15), and classmates without medical illness (N=68), respectively. Shifting, inhibition, and working memory were assessed, respectively, using three Test of Everyday Attention: Children's Version (TEA-Ch) subtests: Creature Counting, Walk-Don't-Walk, and Code Transmission.

Standards of Psychosocial Care for Parents of Children With Cancer.

Parents and caregivers of children with cancer are both resilient and deeply affected by the child's cancer. A systematic review of published research since 1995 identified 138 studies of moderate quality indicating that parent distress increases around diagnosis, then returns to normal levels. Post-traumatic symptoms are common.

Temperament and social behavior in pediatric brain tumor survivors and comparison peers.

Objective: To examine the role of temperament (i.e., surgency/positive affect, negative affect, and effortful control) in the social behavior of pediatric brain tumor survivors and comparison classmates.

Social self-perception among pediatric brain tumor survivors compared with peers.

Objective: To assess self-perceptions of social behavior among children treated for a brain tumor and comparison children. To investigate group differences in the accuracy of children's self-perceptions as measured by discrepancies between self and peer reports of social behavior and to understand if these phenomena differ by gender.

Method: Self and peer reports of social behavior were obtained in the classrooms of 116 children who were treated for an intracranial tumor.

Late effects in survivors of childhood CNS tumors treated on Head Start I and II protocols.

Background: Due to the devastating late effects associated with cranial irradiation in young children with central nervous system (CNS) tumors, treatment for these patients has evolved to include the use of intensive chemotherapy to either avoid or postpone irradiation. While survival outcomes have improved, late effects data in survivors treated on such regimens are needed.

Objective: This multi-institutional study comprehensively describes late effects in survivors treated on the Head Start I/II protocols.

The role of coping and temperament in the adjustment of children with cancer.

Objective: To examine the extent to which stress, coping, and temperament accounted for variability in adjustment among children with cancer.

Methods: Seventy-five mothers of children with cancer (ages 5-17) completed questionnaires regarding their child's cancer-related stress; coping; temperament characteristics including positive affect (PA), negative affect (NA), and effortful control (EC); and symptoms of anxiety and depression. Assessments occurred within one year of initial diagnosis or relapse (M = 5.