Identifying school performance problems in the pediatric office

The AAP has underscored the role and responsibility of pediatricians in screening their patients for developmental and learning problems and working with parents, schools, and other professionals to ensure that students with these problems receive appropriate educational and therapeutic interventions. We have proposed a model that is time-efficient and can be tailored to the level of interest and experience of the pediatrician. At a minimum, the primary care physician should elicit any parental concerns about school performance, affirm these, and direct the student and parents to appropriate resources in the community for further evaluation and intervention as necessary. Pediatricians who wish to understand more fully the nature and underpinnings of their patients' learning difficulties can formulate a preliminary diagnosis and develop a plan for treatment using a structured system of information gathering that can be combined with information about the child's medical status and supplemented by brief direct testing in the office setting. By following these approaches, primary care pediatricians can provide comprehensive care for their patients and their families in their medical home and also can derive considerable professional satisfaction.