Upcoming Webinars

Introduction The obesity rate in preschool children in the United States (US) is 13.9%, while even higher rates are associated with racial and ethnic minorities and children from low-income families. These prevalence patterns underscore the need to identify effective childhood obesity prevention programs.     Method A scoping review was conducted following Arksey and O’Malley’s framework to provide an overview of the types, effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of obesity prevention interventions and policies in children up to 6 years old. Inclusion criteria were studies at least 6- months duration; included a weight-based outcome, conducted in the US, English publications from January 2001 to February 2018. Exclusions: studies in  overweight/obese children and …

Featuring Sharon Goldfeld, FRACP, FAFPHM, PhD (Deputy Director, Centre for Community Child Health, The Royal Children’s Hospital Melbourne). This webinar will explore how the EDI is being utilized in Australia. The EDI has been collected on all children starting school every three years across Australia since 2009 (1 million children). It has been linked to other data to provide rich and granular data for research, analysis, and public policy purposes.   For more background information, please see the Australian Early Development Census website: www.aedc.gov.au   Sharon Goldfeld, FRACP, FAFPHM, PhD (Deputy Director, Centre for Community Child Health, The Royal Children’s Hospital Melbourne)   Webinar recording available here   Slides available …

Abstract   Integrated care is a promising practice to promote health equity and improve population health across the life course, but the mechanisms needed to integrate services remain nebulous. This study aimed to identify the components required to achieve a fully integrated health care system as articulated by social work trainees. The authors conducted five focus groups (N = 20). Transcripts were analyzed using structural and pattern coding. Three primary themes emerged: Organizational Structure and Support, Personal and Interpersonal Dynamics, and Practitioner Knowledge. Results from this study can inform the process of integration and has implications for social work education.   Access the Paper here  

Abstract   Children exposed to socioeconomic adversity have elevated levels of psychological difficulties immediately and long-term. However, few studies have examined the consequences of long-term patterns of dynamic trajectories of family income. The Danish National Birth Cohort (DNBC) is a longitudinal, population-based birth cohort study (1996–2002). Data on household poverty from the year before birth until the child was 10 years of age (n=12 measures) were obtained from the National Danish Registries and modeled using semiparametric groupbased modeling. Child mental health symptoms were measured at 11 years using mother and child-reported Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaires (n=40 192), and the child-reported Stress in Childhood (SiC) scale (n=46 284). Four categories of …

Abstract   Aims and objectives: To create a framework for future research through application and critique of the Life Course Health Development Model to the phenomenon of  paediatric delirium.   Conclusions: The Life Course Health Development Model depicts a process in which  the acute and severe stress of critical illness leads to maladaptive neurologic changes  that contribute to the development of delirium and impair a child’s life trajectory.   Relevance to clinical practice: By emphasising the potential lifelong consequences  for critically ill children who experience delirium, this application of the Life Course  Health Development Model will stimulate discussion, research and practice change among paediatric clinicians and researchers.   Access the Paper here  

Featuring Neal Halfon, MD, MPH (Director, UCLA Center for Healthier Children, Families, and Communities) and Lisa Stanley, DrPH (Project Director, Transforming Early Childhood Community Systems, UCLA CHCFC)   This webinar will describe the rollout of the EDI in the US and explore how the EDI is being utilized by communities such as San Antonio, Hartford, Spartanburg, and Pasadena, to engage all segments of the community in collective work to improve local early childhood programs, systems and policies.   Neal Halfon, MD, MPH (Director, UCLA Center for Healthier Children, Families, and Communities)   Lisa Stanley, DrPH (Project Director, Transforming Early Childhood Community Systems, UCLA CHCFC)   Webinar recording  available here   …

This webinar, part of the LCRN’s series on Measuring Health Development of Children and Youth, features Martin Guhn, PhD (Assistant Professor, Human Early Learning Partnership, University of British Columbia) and Magdalena Janus, PhD (Professor, McMaster University).   This webinar will provide an introduction to a comprehensive life course monitoring system that supports a systems approach, how Canada has made an impact with EDI, and how they are building the early stages of the system with the TDI and CHEQ measurement systems.   Martin Guhn, PhD (Assistant Professor, Human Early Learning Partnership, University of British Columbia)   Magdalena Janus, PhD (Professor, McMaster University)   Webinar recording available here  

Abstract   Learning social skills is a cumulative, lifelong task, the consequences of which can influence subsequent generations. These skills, built on temperamental differences observable early in infancy, are manifest in all stages of life, and they can be taught and reinforced at all ages and in numerous social settings. Social skill acquisition is profoundly important in attaining personal satisfaction in relationships and achieving success in many spheres of life, including parenting.   Learning effective social skills is strongly influenced by the circumstances in which social development occurs. Professionals, who are uniquely positioned to observe and help shape relationship skills, have a special responsibility to be aware of those educational …

This is one of 26 chapters published in the Handbook of Life Course Health Development.   Abstract: This chapter begins with an assertion that, beyond the cultural traditions that affirm childhood as a period of special and lasting importance, a new science of child development reveals an influence of the early years throughout the life course. Through processes of “biological embedding,” early developmental experiences and exposures become neurobiologically instantiated in the brain and genome, thereby affecting trajectories of health and development for the remainder of life. The socioeconomic maldistribution of exposures to adversities and misfortune allots a disproportionate share of physical and mental morbidities to those growing up in conditions of …

The 2016 Lancet Early Childhood Development Series highlights early childhood development at a time when it has been universally endorsed in the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. This Series considers new scientific evidence for interventions, building on the findings and recommendations of previous Lancet Series on child development (2007, 2011), and proposes pathways for implementation of early childhood development at scale. The Series emphasises ‘nurturing care’, especially of children below three years of age, and multi-sectoral interventions starting with health, which can have wide reach to families and young children through health and nutrition.   Read full article