Paediatric Screening Tools

Several tools have been developed to assist healthcare providers in taking a comprehensive history of mental health issues. These include standardized screening questionnaires and tools designed to facilitate rapport between the provider and youth.

Many providers have found that using a standardized screening tool can help them improve child outcomes. The process allows them to identify developmental concerns earlier and increase referrals to early intervention services.

PSC

PSC is an asymptomatic, progressive disease with significant morbidity and mortality and a high prevalence of complications that necessitate liver transplantation. It is common among people with inflammatory bowel diseases, sarcoidosis and chronic pancreatitis, and genetic factors may play a role.

Although a hepatologist can make the diagnosis on the basis of clinical and laboratory features, it requires endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography (ERCP) for confirmation. This procedure can reveal biliary strictures, and a high rate of malignant transformation.

Despite the emphasis on elevated alkaline phosphatase (ALP) as a surrogate endpoint in most PSC trials, a reduction of this marker is not necessarily indicative of clinical efficacy. Further, the fluctuating natural course of PSC is poorly captured by current severity and prognostic measures (over and above transient aggravations related to intercurrent events). Nevertheless, there are many promising avenues for therapy in PSC, including antifibrotics, therapy directed at gut microbiota, and hepatobile acid modulators. These are likely to require combination therapy covering several aspects of PSC pathogenesis.

CSF

The PSC is a four-item screening tool that identifies hospital inpatients up to 16 years who are at risk of malnutrition. A positive score on the PSC indicates a need for further assessment and intervention. Using the PSC can help prevent malnutrition deterioration, reduce complications from disease, accelerate recovery and reduce costs1.

This tool uses standardized questionnaires that ask questions about a child’s behavior, movement, thinking and emotions. It can be used by nurses, doctors and other healthcare providers. Paediatric screening Tools can identify problems that may otherwise go unnoticed, especially in children living in poverty. They also promote early intervention, which can help prevent the long-term effects of mental health problems.

Using ROC curve analysis, the sensitivity and specificity of both tools were evaluated with their original cutoff points and against the reference standard SGNA for concurrent validity. Using adjusted nutrition-risk cutoffs, both tools showed acceptable sensitivity and specificity. Children identified as nutrition-risk by either tool had longer LOS than those not identified as such.