Concept of Health Care Counseling for Pediatricians

Health care counseling (HCC) is a relatively new concept that amalgamates human biology, human psychology and medical sociology principles, and applies the same in real-time clinical situations. In India, there is a real paucity of trained mental health personnel, and hence counseling services are restricted to few departments. HCC is especially important for the child population, as the pediatricians need to partner the parenting responsibilities in different illness care settings covering the period from newborn to adolescence. This paper proposes steps for further development of the concept, expertise and systematic training program for health personnel, as an activity of Centre for Health Care Counseling Studies under Kerala University of Health Sciences. Once the process is documented, we hope that the same would be made available to other states in India.