Health care transition for youth with special health care needs.

Purpose: Youth with special health care needs (YSHCN) increasingly live into adulthood, and approximately 500,000 U.S. youth transition from pediatric to adult health care systems annually.

Interventions to improve screening and follow-up in primary care: a systematic review of the evidence.

Background: The American Academy of Pediatrics and other organizations recommend several screening tests as part of preventive care. The proportion of children who are appropriately screened and who receive follow-up care is low.

Objective: To conduct a systematic review of the evidence for practice-based interventions to increase the proportion of patients receiving recommended screening and follow-up services in pediatric primary care.

Evidence for family-centered care for children with special health care needs: a systematic review.

Objective: Family-centered care (FCC) has received widespread endorsement for use in care in the United States. In this study, we conducted a systematic review of evidence for FCC focusing specifically on family-provider partnership as the activity that constitutes FCC.

Methods: We found and reviewed articles from the medical, nursing, psychology, and sociology literature spanning 1986 to 2010.

Health inequity in children and youth with chronic health conditions.

Background: Over the last decades, there have been great advances in health care delivered to children with chronic conditions, but not all children have benefitted equally from them.

Objectives: To describe health inequities experienced by children with chronic health conditions.

Methods: We performed a literature review of English-language studies identified from the Medline, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Cancer Institute, and Cystic Fibrosis Foundation Web sites that were published between January 1985 and May 2009, included children aged 0 to 18 years, and contained the key words "incidence," "prevalence," "survival," "mortality," or "disparity" in the title or abstract for the following health conditions: acute leukemia, asthma, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), autism spectrum disorders, cerebral palsy, cystic fibrosis, diabetes mellitus, Down syndrome, HIV/AIDS, major congenital heart defects, major depressive disorder, sickle cell anemia, spina bifida, and traumatic brain injury.

Care coordination for children with special health care needs: evaluation of a state experiment.

Care coordination (CC), a component of the medical home, may aid families who have children with special health care needs (CSHCN). Few data link CC to individual patient outcomes. To compare parent-reported outcomes for CSHCN receiving practice-based care coordination with those receiving standard care.

The future of health insurance for children with special health care needs.

Context: Because of their elevated need for services, health insurance is particularly important for children with special health care needs. In this article we assess how well the current system is meeting the insurance needs of children with special health care needs and how emerging trends in health insurance may affect their well-being.

Methods: We begin with a review of the evidence on the impact of health insurance on the health care experiences of children with special health care needs based on the peer-reviewed literature.

A review of the evidence for the medical home for children with special health care needs.

Context: The receipt of health care in a medical home is increasingly touted as a fundamental basis for improved care for persons with chronic conditions, yet the evidence for this claim has not been systematically assessed.

Objective: Our goal was to determine the evidence for the federal Maternal and Child Health Bureau recommendation that children with special health care needs receive ongoing comprehensive care within a medical home.

Methods: We searched the nursing and medical literature, references of selected articles, and requested expert recommendations.

A family-centered, community-based system of services for children and youth with special health care needs.

Objective: To present a conceptual definition of a family-centered system of services for children and youth with special health care needs (CYSHCN). Previous work by the Maternal and Child Health Bureau to define CYSHCN has had widespread program effects. This article similarly seeks to provide a definition of a system of services.