Screening Tools for Child Abuse Used by Healthcare Providers: A Systematic Review

The early detection of child abuse is essential for children at risk. Healthcare professionals working at hospitals and in the community are often the first to encounter suspected cases of child abuse. Therefore, an accurate identification of child abuse is critical for intervention. However, there is no consensus on the best method to screen for child abuse.

This systematic review was designed to evaluate the relevant psychometric properties and critically appraise the methodological quality of child abuse screening tools used by healthcare providers with children less than 18 years old.

We searched the Cochrane Library, MEDLINE, Embase, CINAHL, Education Resources Information Center, PubMed, Airiti Library, and OpenGray databases for studies on screening tools used to identify abuse in children published through October 2019 in English or Chinese. Information regarding populations, assessment methods, and accuracy parameters were extracted. Study quality was assessed using the COnsensus-based Standards for the selection of health Measurement INstruments checklist and Grading of Recommendation, Assessment, Development, and Evaluation criteria.

Nine hundred thirty-nine abstracts and 23 full-text articles were reviewed for eligibility, and 15 screening tools for child abuse used by healthcare providers were identified. Screening tools often assess the presence of more than one form of abuse, but no single tool covered all forms. Of these, 10 tools screened for a single, discrete type of abuse, including nine physical abuse screening tools (three abusive head trauma tools) and one sexual abuse tool. Eighty percent (n = 12) of the screening tools had a moderate-to-high quality of evidence based on the Grading of Recommendation, Assessment, Development, and Evaluation criteria. However, none of these screening tools achieved an adequate level of evidence based on the COnsensus-based Standards for the selection of health Measurement INstruments checklist.

In this systematic literature review, 15 assessment tools of child abuse used by healthcare providers were identified, of which nine screened for physical abuse. Screening tools must be valid, succinct, user-friendly, and amenable for use with children at every point of care in the healthcare system. Because of the paucity of informative and practical studies in the literature, findings related to the quality of child abuse screening tools were inconclusive. Therefore, future research should focus on the use of screening tools in the healthcare system to identify effective screening interventions that may help healthcare providers identify child abuse cases as early as possible.