Family-Centered Pediatric Nursing Care: State of the Science

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The purposes of this article were to summarize the development of family-centered pediatric care, review the current state of nursing research in this area, and recommend directions for future study. A literature review of 30 nursing research studies between 1995 and 2006 was conducted. Results revealed that evidence of consistent provision of family-centered pediatric care is lacking. Many areas of research remain undeveloped, but there is a solid foundation for moving forward in conducting research focused on assisting nurses in implementing this basic philosophy of practice in all settings and situations in which children receive health care.

Section snippets

Background

Historically, hospitalized children in the early half of the 20th century were cared for exclusively by health professionals, and visitation by parents was either extremely restricted (Frank, 1952) or completely prohibited (Alsop-Shields & Mohay, 2001). Attitudes and practice began to change in the 1950s and 1960s largely due to the work of Bowlby (1953), who demonstrated serious emotional, psychological, and developmental consequences of separation between mother and child, and to the work of

Methods

To examine the current state of pediatric nursing research in FCC, a literature search was conducted entering the terms family centered or family centred in the Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL) and PubMed. The CINAHL database indexes journals from the fields of nursing and allied health and includes all English-language nursing journals. PubMed is a comprehensive database developed at the National Library of Medicine within the National Institutes of Health and

State of the Science Related to FCC

The sample of 30 articles will be reviewed in three sections: researcher observations of parent–nurse interactions, research examining the perspective of parents or family caregivers, and research examining the perspective of health professionals.

Summary and Future Directions

The nursing literature focused on the research of FCC over the past decade reflects support for the elements of FCC as described by Shelton and Stepanek (1994). Families value and expect a relationship of partnership with health professionals. Nurses support the concept of FCC but experience difficulty in implementing this philosophy of care in practice.

FCC is multifaceted, requiring a variety of approaches to adequately study both its effectiveness and its implementation. Several strengths in

Conclusion

FCC has appropriately been adopted as a philosophy of care for pediatric nursing. The concept has evolved from allowing parents to visit their hospitalized child to welcoming parents as full participants in partnership with health professionals. Current research has demonstrated that families value and desire FCC and that nurses agree with this philosophy. It is disheartening to note that more than 50 years after Blake (1954) first set forth the essentials of FCC, pediatric nurses continue to

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