A Novel Mental Health Curriculum Pilot for Pediatric Cardiology Fellows: Preparing the Subspecialist to Expand the Team.

Mental health (MH) is an important, yet understudied area of care for patients with congenital heart disease (CHD). Pediatric subspecialty fellows believe MH should be within their scope of practice, but few feel confident in their ability to appropriately screen, evaluate, manage, and make treatment referrals for youth with CHD and concurrent MH concerns. A 6-session, didactic-based curriculum was designed by an interprofessional team of experts. It was administered to pediatric cardiology fellows over 9 months during two academic years. Topics included the following: Introduction to MH and CHD, MH Screening and Clinic-Based Interventions, Psychopharmacology, Delirium, Trauma-Informed Care, and Adult CHD and Transitional Care. An investigator-designed survey was developed to assess fellow comfort with MH knowledge, screening, and treatment recommendation domains. Twenty-three fellows participated with 14 completing the pre-post survey (58% participation, 11/17 in year 1, 3/6 in year 2). Most participants were in their first year of training (9/14, 57%). Overall, fellow comfort with MH topics increased significantly (mean score 2.89 ± 0.46 vs. 3.4 ± 0.4, p = 0.0005), with improved comfort in the MH knowledge (p = 0.003) and treatment recommendation domains (p = 0.001). A didactic-based MH curriculum improves the comfort of pediatric cardiology fellows to address the MH concerns of their patients. The topics in this curriculum will continue to be refined over time and could be generalized to training programs, both nationally and across pediatric specialties, to improve MH care for high-risk populations.

Publishing on a Shoestring: Understanding Barriers, Challenges, and Unique Opportunities to Academic Productivity in Psychiatry.

PURPOSE OF REVIEW: Clinical track faculty within psychiatry may struggle to meet goals for academic scholarship, particularly publishing. In this review, we explore potential barriers to publication and solutions to support early career psychiatrists. RECENT FINDINGS: Current evidence highlights challenges for faculty throughout academic practice, including barriers at the individual and systems levels. Within psychiatry, publication has favored biological studies with significant gaps in the literature serving as both an opportunity and challenge. Interventions underscore the importance of mentorship and propose incentivization to facilitate academic scholarship among clinical track faculty. Barriers to publication within psychiatry exist at the level of the individual, system, and field itself. This review shares potential solutions from across the medical literature and an example of an intervention from our own department. More studies are needed within the field of psychiatry to understand how to best support early career faculty members in their academic productivity, growth, and development.

A Review of Telepsychiatry for Pediatric Patients in the Emergency Setting.

PURPOSE OF REVIEW: The purpose of this review is to summarize factors contributing to the current state of pediatric mental health access in ED settings and synthesize the existing literature on the use of telepsychiatry to extend access to care, with particular focus on feasibility and sustainability. RECENT FINDINGS: Children are presenting to emergency departments (EDs) with mental health concerns at an increasing rate, while ED capacity to treat psychiatric needs in children remains insufficient. This growing problem is compounded by decreased access to outpatient care and inpatient psychiatric beds, resulting in exorbitantly long waiting times, or "boarding," of children in crisis. Telepsychiatry has emerged as a strategy to decrease boarding of pediatric patients in ED settings by utilizing remote psychiatric professionals to provide consultation and assessment. Telepsychiatry in ED settings is an effective strategy to increase access to care and decrease length of stay for pediatric patients.

Patterns of Delirium in a Pediatric Intensive Care Unit and Associations With Noise Pollution.

Objective: Delirium is a common problem in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) and is associated with increased length of stay, cost and mortality. This study evaluated the relationship between noise pollution and delirium risk. Design: This is a Quality Improvement (QI) initiative at an academic PICU. Sound levels were monitored and patients were screened for delirium using the Cornell Assessment of Pediatric Delirium (CAPD). Setting PICU Patients: All PICU patients Interventions: None Measurements and Main Results: Over the 83-week study period (2015-2017), the median [IQR] CAPD score was 8 [3 to 14]. Nursing compliance with the CAPD was 72.2%. The proportion of patients screening positive for delirium (CAPD ≥ 9) was 45.9%. A total of 329 711 hly decibel (dB) measurements were collected and reported. Occupied rooms were louder than unoccupied rooms (51.8 [51.6-51.9] dB vs. 49.8 [49.7-49.9] dB, respectively, p < 0.001). Days (10 AM to 4 PM) were louder than nights (11 PM to 5 AM) (52.8 [52.7-53.0] dB vs. 50.7 [49.9-51.5] dB, respectively p < 0.001) in occupied rooms. Winter (Nov-Feb) months were louder than summer (May-Aug) months (52.0 [51.8-52.3] dB vs. 51.5 [51.3-51.7] dB, respectively, p < 0.002) in occupied rooms. Median weekly nighttime noise levels and CAPD scores demonstrated a correlation coefficient of 0.6 (p < 0.001). Median weekly risk of mortality (ROM) and CAPD scores demonstrated a correlation coefficient of 0.15 (p < 0.01). Conclusions: Significant noise pollution exists in the PICU with a moderate correlation between nighttime noise levels and CAPD scores. This could potentially implicate noise pollution as a risk factor for the development of delirium.

Training Needs Assessment Survey in Pediatric Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry.

OBJECTIVE: Despite growing recognition of how curriculum modules can benefit child and adolescent psychiatry (CAP) training, there are few standardized teaching resources for pediatric consultation-liaison psychiatry (PCLP). A Special Interest Group (SIG) of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Physically Ill Child Committee (PICC) conducted a needs assessment to establish interest in, and availability of, a library of online, self-paced learning modules specific to PCLP. METHOD: An email needs assessment survey was distributed to the PICC listserv in the fall of 2019 with four core areas of inquiry: (1) clinical service description, (2) teaching barriers, (3) interest in curriculum resources, and (4) interest in evaluation resources. RESULTS: Respondents were representative of typical academic PCLP programs. The response rate was 28% (n = 39). Programs endorsed barriers to teaching including high service obligations and limited protected teaching time. All respondents indicated that they would utilize high-quality, online learning modules. Psychiatric complications of medical illness, catatonia, and delirium were identified as priority topics in the care of pediatric patients with comorbid medical conditions. CONCLUSIONS: There are currently no published educational studies regarding the training needs for PCLP programs, even among tertiary care academic facilities. This training needs assessment is the first step in establishing a national PCLP training curriculum. New paradigms to develop standardized curriculum resources for PCLP are needed.

Psychiatric Evaluation and Management in Pediatric Spinal Cord Injuries: a Review.

PURPOSE OF REVIEW: To summarize current key recommendations in the evaluation and management of mental health disorders associated with spinal cord injuries (SCI) among pediatric patients, based on a review of recent evidence-based literature and clinical experience. RECENT FINDINGS: Anticipating potential mental health risks among youth with SCI and implementing early multidisciplinary management improves physical and mental health outcomes. When caregivers of youth with SCI model healthy coping strategies, it promotes healthy coping strategies in patients themselves. Peer mentor programs can be instrumental in patient adjustment, improve mental health, and aid in recovery. Pediatric SCI is particularly impactful on a child's development and individuation. Early involvement of a mental health team while in the hospital can help with the initial adjustment period and address psychiatric concerns that might interfere with recovery. The transition from the hospital to home is a period of vulnerability for individuals with SCI.

Adolescents with unexplained chest pain reported depression and impaired emotional and social functioning.

AIM: Chest pain is common in adolescence, but there are no established criteria for managing this problem, which is rarely associated with cardiac disease. This study addressed the gaps in the literature by evaluating psychosocial factors that could be associated with medically unexplained chest pain. METHODS: We consecutively selected 100 patients (68% girls) aged 13-18 who were diagnosed with unexplained chest pain when they presented to the cardiology outpatient clinics of Tepecik Research Hospital, Izmir, Turkey, between 30 September 2015 and 30 June 2018. The controls were 76 age- and sex-matched adolescents (69% girls) aged 13-18 who were undergoing routine cardiology assessments before joining sports clubs. We assessed their health-related quality of life and any depression and physical symptoms. RESULTS: Regression analysis showed some adolescents were a number of times more likely to report chest pain. These included those who reported boredom (4.1 times), felt stressed or anxious (2.2) and those who experienced sleep disturbance (2.6), co-morbid headaches (2.0), back pain (3.1) and impaired social functioning (1.2). CONCLUSION: The results indicated a significant association between unexplained chest pain and physical symptoms, depression and impaired emotional and social functioning. These factors warrant further evaluation.

Exploring the Telepsychiatry Experience: Primary Care Provider Perception of the Michigan Child Collaborative Care (MC3) Program.

BACKGROUND: Pediatric mental healthcare is a growing component of primary care practice. However, there is a lack of access to mental health services, particularly those provided by Child and Adolescent Psychiatrists. The Michigan Child Collaborative Care (MC3) Program is a telepsychiatry service that offers embedded behavioral health consultants within primary care practices, telephonic consultation, video consultation and embedded care. Primary care provider (PCP) utilization of telepsychiatry services is predicated on perceiving the consultation service as user-friendly, helpful, and feasible in their practice. OBJECTIVE: A survey of PCPs was conducted over a 5-year period to assess PCP attitudes and perceptions regarding MC3 consultation, including measures of efficiency, user-friendliness, and confidence in providing mental healthcare. The survey contained 4 items, (2 quantitative and 2 qualitative), and took less than 2 minutes to complete. RESULTS: 649 responses were received out of 1475 possible responses (44% response rate). Common themes elicited from the qualitative items included perception of improved patient care for youth with mental illness (45.3%), improved comfort and confidence in caring for youth with mental illness (30.9%), greater comfort with the prescribing and monitoring of psychotropics (25.9%) and improved access to mental healthcare for youth (23.1%). PCPs strongly agreed that MC3 was user-friendly, efficient, and enhanced their confidence in managing pediatric mental health concerns. CONCLUSIONS: This study demonstrates that the MC3 Telepsychiatry Program is well accepted by PCPs with self-reported improvements in providing mental healthcare to patients. Future research should explore how PCP perception impacts PCP practice, knowledge, as well as outcomes for patients and families longitudinally.

Quality Improvement Initiative to Reduce Pediatric Intensive Care Unit Noise Pollution With the Use of a Pediatric Delirium Bundle.

OBJECTIVES:: Noise pollution in pediatric intensive care units (PICU) contributes to poor sleep and may increase risk of developing delirium. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recommends <45 decibels (dB) in hospital environments. The objectives are to assess the degree of PICU noise pollution, to develop a delirium bundle targeted at reducing noise, and to assess the effect of the bundle on nocturnal noise pollution. METHODS:: This is a QI initiative at an academic PICU. Thirty-five sound sensors were installed in patient bed spaces, hallways, and common areas. The pediatric delirium bundle was implemented in 8 pilot patients (40 patient ICU days) while 108 non-pilot patients received usual care over a 28-day period. RESULTS:: A total of 20,609 hourly dB readings were collected. Hourly minimum, average, and maximum dB of all occupied bed spaces demonstrated medians [interquartile range] of 48.0 [39.0-53.0], 52.8 [48.1-56.2] and 67.0 [63.5-70.5] dB, respectively. Bed spaces were louder during the day (10AM to 4PM) than at night (11PM to 5AM) (53.5 [49.0-56.8] vs. 51.3 [46.0-55.3] dB, P < 0.01). Pilot patient rooms were significantly quieter than non-pilot patient rooms at night (n=210, 45.3 [39.7-55.9]) vs. n=1841, 51.2 [46.9-54.8] dB, P < 0.01). The pilot rooms compliant with the bundle had the lowest hourly nighttime average dB (44.1 [38.5-55.5]). CONCLUSIONS:: Substantial noise pollution exists in our PICU, and utilizing the pediatric delirium bundle led to a significant noise reduction that can be perceived as half the loudness with hourly nighttime average dB meeting the EPA standards when compliant with the bundle.

The Impact of Psychotropic Medications on Bone Health in Youth.

PURPOSE OF REVIEW: Psychotropics are prescribed to youth at rapidly growing rates and may negatively impact bone health. Little awareness exists of this association among prescribing providers. Childhood and adolescence are critical times for bone development. Understanding these effects and their management is important to informed psychotropic use. RECENT FINDINGS: Through a variety of mechanisms, antidepressants, benzodiazepines, mood stabilizers, neuroleptics, and stimulants may all negatively impact pediatric bone health. This confers added risk of osteoporosis in a population already at high risk for suboptimal bone health. Awareness of psychotropic-mediated effects on pediatric bone development is clinically relevant to the use and monitoring of these agents. Clinicians can manage these effects through informed consent, vitamin D supplementation, lifestyle modifications, and reducing polypharmacy. For mood stabilizers, vitamin D level monitoring and secondary prevention is indicated. Future longitudinal studies and development of monitoring guidelines regarding psychotropic impact on bone health are necessary.

Pediatric Somatic Symptom Disorders.

Somatic symptom disorder (SSD) is a common disorder encountered in pediatric medicine. It involves the presentation of physical symptoms that are either disproportionate or inconsistent with history, physical examination, laboratory, and other investigative findings. SSDs result in significant impairment with considerable increase in healthcare utilization, school absenteeism, and the potential for unnecessary diagnostic evaluation and treatment intervention. Patients and families often feel dismissed and may worry that a serious condition has been missed. Primary care providers are frequently frustrated due to a lack of a successful approach to patients and families impacted by SSD. The result is often a cycle of disability, frustration and missed opportunities for collaboration towards enhanced patient functionality. This review summarizes the current evidence-based understanding, as well as insights from clinician experience, on the evaluation and management of pediatric SSD.

Pediatric Delirium: Evaluation, Management, and Special Considerations.

Delirium describes a syndrome of acute brain dysfunction with severe consequences on patient outcomes, medical cost, morbidity, and mortality. It represents a final common pathway of numerous pathophysiologic disturbances disrupting cerebral homeostasis. The diagnosis is predicated on recognition of the clinical features of the syndrome through ongoing clinical assessment. Early identification can be aided by routine screening, particularly in high-risk populations. Evaluation and management are continuous and simultaneous processes involving a multidisciplinary care team including child psychiatry consultation. Prevention, early identification and management are critical in alleviating symptoms, improving outcomes, and reducing distress for patients, families, and care teams. This review highlights our current understanding regarding pediatric delirium, its mechanisms, clinical manifestations, detection and management.

National Survey on Pediatric Acute Agitation and Behavioral Escalation in Academic Inpatient Pediatric Care Settings.

BACKGROUND: Pediatric acute agitation and behavioral escalation (PAABE) is common and disruptive to pediatric inpatient health care. There is a paucity of literature on PAABE in noncritical care inpatient pediatric care settings with little consensus on its evaluation and management. METHODS: In January 2016, a 34-question survey was e-mailed to pediatric hospitalists and consultation-liaison psychiatrists through their respective professional listservs. Excluded responses included incomplete surveys, and surveys from providers in community care settings. The survey consisted of multiple-choice questions, rating scales, and free-text responses relating to the identification, education, and evaluation and management of PAABE at the respondent's respective hospital. RESULTS: Responses were obtained from 38 North American academic children's hospitals. Of the respondents, 69.3% were pediatric hospitalists and 30.7% were pediatric psychiatry consultants. Most respondents practice in urban areas (84.2%), and in hospitals with ≥100 beds (89.4%). Overall, 84.2% of the respondents encountered PAABE at least once a month and as frequently as every week. Most respondents (70.0%) rated PAABE as an 8 or higher on a 10-point Likert scale. Despite being highly important and common, 53.9% of respondents do not screen for risk factors for PAABE, 63.6% reported no formal process to facilitate caregiver involvement in managing PAABE, and 59.7% indicated no physician training in PAABE evaluation and management. CONCLUSION: Many pediatric hospitals identify PAABE as a great concern, yet there is little training, screening, or standardization of care in PAABE. There is a need to consolidate existing knowledge regarding PAABE, while developing enhanced collaboration, training, and standardized practice in inpatient PAABE.

Effect of Psychotherapy on Health Care Utilization in Children With Inflammatory Bowel Disease and Depression.

OBJECTIVES: Pediatric patients with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) are at an increased risk of developing depression compared with community controls. Depression often negatively influences illness behaviors such as resource utilization. We sought to investigate the effects of treating depression on utilization of medical resources in depressed pediatric patients with IBD by comparing rates of health care utilization 1 year before and after psychotherapy. METHOD: Two hundred seventeen subjects ages 9 to 17 years with IBD and depression received 3 months of psychotherapy for depression as part of a multicenter randomized controlled trial. Of these 217 subjects, 70 had utilization data available 1 year prior and 1 year after receiving 3 months of psychotherapy. Primary outcomes included frequency of hospitalizations, inpatient hospital days, outpatient gastrointestinal visits, and number of emergency room visits, radiological examinations, and endoscopies. Within subject analyses were completed comparing health care utilization 12 months before psychotherapy compared with the 12 months after the conclusion of psychotherapy. RESULTS: Fifty-one and 19 patients had CD and UC, respectively. A total of 55.7% of patients had major depression and 44.3% had minor depression. Overall, all study measures of health care utilization were significantly reduced after psychotherapy (P < 0.01)-including gastrointestinal-related (mean values) hospitalization frequency, inpatient days, outpatient visit, emergency room visits, radiological examinations, and endoscopies. CONCLUSIONS: Psychotherapy for comorbid depression in pediatric patients with IBD is associated with decreased GI-related health care utilization. The present study highlights the importance of screening for depression in a pediatric population with IBD, and that psychotherapy may be a reasonable adjunctive treatment for pediatric patients with IBD and comorbid depression.

Virtual Schooling and Pediatric Mental Health During the COVID-19 Pandemic.

In this single-site, retrospective, descriptive chart review and survey, we investigated changes in pediatric behavioral health needs during the COVID-19 pandemic and the relationship between virtual schooling and hospitalized children's mental health. Subjects included patients aged 6 and 18 years during the 2015 to 2019 and 2020 to 2021 school years who received inpatient mental health care. Parents of patients admitted in 2020 to 2021 were surveyed regarding their child's schooling. We additionally described and compared subjects using descriptive data, including proxies for illness severity, and assessed how these outcomes changed during the pandemic and correlated with school modality. During the pandemic, the distribution of diagnoses changed, and some markers of severity increased. Patients in exclusively virtual school had higher rates of mood and anxiety disorders and tic disorders, and lower rates of eating and disruptive behavior disorders, than patients with recent in-person school. Further study is needed regarding the impact of virtual schooling on pediatric mental health.

Addressing the Pediatric Mental Health Crisis in Emergency Departments in the US: Findings of a National Pediatric Boarding Consensus Panel.

BACKGROUND: In 2021, several professional organizations declared a national state of emergency in child and adolescent mental health. Rising volume and acuity of pediatric mental health emergencies, coupled with reduced access to inpatient psychiatric care, has caused tremendous downstream pressures on EDs resulting in long lengths of stay, or "boarding", for youth awaiting psychiatric admission. Nationally, boarding times are highly heterogeneous, with medical / surgical patients experiencing much shorter boarding times compared to patients with primary mental health needs. There is little guidance on best practices in the care of the pediatric patient with significant mental health need "boarding" in the hospital setting. OBJECTIVE: There is a significant increase in the practice of "boarding" pediatric patients within emergency departments and inpatient medical floors while awaiting psychiatric admission. This study aims to provide consensus guidelines for the clinical care of this population. METHODS: Twenty-three panel participants of fifty-five initial participants (response rate 41.8%) committed to completing four successive rounds of questioning using Delphi consensus gathering methodology. Most (70%) were child psychiatrists and represented 17 health systems. RESULTS: Thirteen participants (56%) recommended maintaining boarded patients in the emergency department, while 78% indicated a temporal limit on boarding in the emergency department should prompt transfer to an inpatient pediatric floor. Of this group, 65% recommended a 24-hour threshold. Most participants (87%) recommended not caring for pediatric patients in the same space as adults. There was unanimous agreement that emergency medicine or hospitalists maintain primary ownership of patient care, while 91% agreed that child psychiatry should maintain a consultative role. Access to social work was deemed most important for staffing, followed by behavioral health nursing, psychiatrists, child life, rehabilitative services, and lastly, learning specialists. There was unanimous consensus that daily evaluation is necessary with 79% indicating vitals should be obtained every 12 hours. All agreed that if a child psychiatric provider is not available on-site, a virtual consultation is sufficient to provide mental health assessment. CONCLUSIONS: This study highlights findings of the first national consensus panel regarding the care of youth boarding in hospital-based settings and provides promising beginnings to standardizing clinical practice while informing future research efforts.

Updates in the Assessment and Management of Agitation.

Agitated patients can be dangerous to themselves and others. In fact, severe medical complications and death can occur with severe agitation. Because of this, agitation is considered a medical and psychiatric emergency. Regardless of the treatment setting, identifying the agitated patient early is a necessary skill. The authors review relevant literature regarding the identification and management of agitation and summarize current recommendations for adults, as well as children and adolescents.

A Review of the Impact of Sociodemographic Factors on the Assessment and Management of Pediatric Somatic Symptom and Related Disorders.

BACKGROUND: While factors such as race, sex, gender identity, and socioeconomic status impact the diagnosis and treatment of a variety of conditions, there are few studies examining their influence on somatic symptom and related disorders (SSRDs), particularly in the pediatric population. OBJECTIVE: In this review, we outline the existing literature on how sociodemographic characteristics influence the overall care of pediatric SSRDs. Throughout this literature review, we highlight opportunities for further research, including potential disparities in evaluation, management, and outcomes along several sociodemographic domains. METHODS: We conducted a thorough review of the evidence for potential impact of race, sex, gender identity, and socioeconomic status on the presentation, diagnosis, management, and outcomes of pediatric somatization and SSRDs. RESULTS: Recent studies evaluating the impact of race on SSRD care suggest the potential for provider bias in the evaluation and management of this population based on racial differences in diagnostic evaluations. Somatization may present differently based on a patient's race and potential cross-cultural status. Among studies of cisgender patients, there is evidence of provider bias in the assessment of somatic symptoms such that female patients are more likely to be diagnosed with an SSRD than male patients. However, there is little research among youth identifying as LGBTQ. The literature also indicates that low socioeconomic status and associated stressors are linked with the development of SSRDs, although it is unclear whether these factors are subject to bias by providers. CONCLUSIONS: While the literature is sparse, there is evidence that sociodemographic factors contribute to differences in diagnosis, evaluation, and management of pediatric SSRDs. These factors, particularly race and sex, may also be subject to provider bias, although further studies are necessary. Provider bias can directly impact patients' perception of care, including feelings of dismissal, and may have downstream influences on symptom manifestation, patient-provider engagement, diagnostic evaluation, and management practices.

Clearing up the smoke: Physical and mental health considerations regarding cannabis use in adolescents with cystic fibrosis.

The cannabis plant is the most used federally illegal drug in the United States and is widely used by adolescents. Cannabis has complex effects on the body and mind. All health professionals who take care of adolescents with cystic fibrosis (CF) should be aware of the factors impacting cannabis use in CF. Given limited evidence regarding the benefits of cannabis and the significant risks, clinicians have the responsibility to identify risk of cannabis use early, counsel patients about the risks, provide a safe space for ongoing conversations about cannabis use in the context of CF care, and deliver evidence-based interventions.