Social Risk Screening for Pediatric Inpatients

Area of Science:

• Pediatric Healthcare
• Social Work in Medicine
• Health Services Research

Background:

• Social risks significantly impact child health outcomes.
• Effective screening tools are crucial for addressing social determinants of health in pediatric populations.
• Current screening instruments may not adequately capture the complexities of social risk in hospitalized children.

Purpose of the Study:

• To identify social risk screening instruments applicable to hospitalized children.
• To evaluate the content validity and methodological quality of identified instruments.

Main Methods:

• Systematic review of 1070 citations, with 146 articles reviewed.
• Abstraction and thematic sorting of individual screening questions.
• Content validity assessed by 13 hospital-based social workers.
• Methodological quality evaluated using the Consensus Based Standards for the Selection of Health Measurement Instruments (COSMIN) checklist.

Main Results:

• 44 unique instruments were identified, but none were applicable to social risk in hospitalized children.
• 61% of instruments focused on a single social risk theme; only 18% covered more than 5 themes.
• The top-scoring instruments addressed only one social risk theme relevant to hospitalized children.

Conclusions:

• A comprehensive, valid, and reliable social risk screening instrument for hospitalized children is currently unavailable.
• Existing tools are too narrow in scope and lack sufficient content validity and methodological rigor for this population.
• There is a significant need for the development of new screening instruments tailored to the unique needs of hospitalized children.