Annual Reports

Pediatricians in practice have spent, on average, four years in medical school and have successfully completed three years in pediatric residency (plus another two-to-three years if they trained in a subspecialty).

These pediatricians have qualified for a medical license in each state in which they practice. And the majority have taken and passed an intense, seven-hour, 335-question exam to become certified by the American Board of Pediatrics (ABP).

This wealth of skills and knowledge provides a strong foundation on which to start a successful and rewarding career. 

Then, to remain current with evolving best practices, pediatricians must keep up with medical…

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Dr. Pamela Londres confers with Dr. Christian Lawrence.The journey of continuous learning for pediatricians begins during residency, when they are gaining the competencies to provide medical care for children without direct supervision. During these years of training, they are guided by pediatric program directors who, along with other pediatric faculty members, monitor their progress and help them identify and fill gaps in their knowledge and skills.

Although residents…

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When a young child comes into the primary care center at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, the medical team reviews vaccination records, checks weight, and screens for dental, vision, and hearing health. As part of the hospital’s Thrive at Five project, the team also checks the child’s speech, literacy, and mental, emotional, and behavioral health. If a child is lagging in any of these areas, the medical team helps the parent or guardian find appropriate resources to prepare the child to succeed in kindergarten.

Thrive at Five is part of Cincinnati Children’s All Children Thrive (ACT) learning network. The network brings together families, community and civic leaders, educators,…

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“This project demonstrates not just that we can develop great QI collaboratives with community-wide stakeholders, but also that we can align the work with the ABP requirements for practitioners to get MOC credit,”

— Dr. Mark Weissman, Chief, Division of General Pediatrics and Community Health

In our nation’s capital, DC Medicaid requires that participating primary care providers offer annual behavioral and mental health screenings for all Medicaid-enrolled children. Despite these mandates, most pediatricians in the District of Columbia were not routinely screening for behavioral or mental health issues at annual well-child…

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FELLOW EARNS MOC CREDIT FOR CREATING MEDICAL RESPONSE TO VICTIMS OF DOMESTIC MINOR SEX TRAFFICKING

Approximately one month into her child abuse pediatrics fellowship at Hasbro Children’s Hospital, Dana Kaplan, MD, had a 16-year-old patient in the clinic who had been exchanging sex for money.

“I went to go speak with her, and I didn’t know what to say,” says Dr. Kaplan, who is now Director of Child Abuse and Neglect for the Department of Pediatrics at Staten Island University Hospital. “I didn’t know what was relevant to ask. I didn’t know what was pertinent to provide her medically.”

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As a pediatric emergency medicine (PEM) physician, Manish Shah knows that a seizure or a severe allergic reaction can be deadly for children if they are not treated quickly and appropriately. With a grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Health Resources and Services Administration’s Emergency Medical Services for Children program, he led the creation of guidelines for treating children during ambulance transport.

That was just the first step, though. He had to find a way to help paramedics understand and implement those new guidelines.

“As part of the project, we created nine different guidelines,” says Dr. Shah, Prehospital/State Partnership Lead,…

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Pediatricians are often the first professionals parents turn to when their child needs behavioral or mental health services — because of their trusting doctor-patient relationship or to avoid the perceived stigma of going to a mental health professional. So when Alexis King’s* middle child needed mental health services, she looked for help where Simon* was already receiving care.

“Unfortunately, our pediatrician was not trained to help us find support,” she says, “and I was left with desperately…

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Since 2012, safety interventions are estimated to have spared more than 9,000 children from serious harm caused by medical errors in nearly 130 hospitals across the United States and Canada, reports Children’s Hospitals’ Solutions for Patient Safety (SPS).1

SPS is a collaborative network of children’s hospitals that share a vision to eliminate serious harm among hospitalized children. The interventions also have saved an estimated $148 million in health care costs.1

“One child harmed is too many,” says Daniel Hyman, MD, Chief Medical and Patient Safety Officer at Children’s Hospital Colorado, which is part of the SPS network. “We’re moving closer and closer to zero harm…

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NEW ASSESSMENT FORMAT TO BECOME DEFAULT OPTION IN 2019 FOLLOWING SUCCESSFUL PILOT

The ABP gave its first examination — administered orally before a panel of three distinguished pediatricians — in June 1934. Since then, just as advances in medicine and technology have improved patient care, testing also has evolved, from oral to paper to computer-based exams.

Now, in response to pediatricians’ comments, and in keeping with modern assessment methods, the ABP has explored ways to make the Maintenance of Certification (MOC) exam better reflect current pediatric practice. The result is Maintenance of Certification Assessment for Pediatrics (MOCA-Peds) — a continuous web…

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Entrustable professional activities (EPAs) describe the routine and essential activities physicians perform in practice and help program directors determine when trainees can be trusted to perform these activities. Although scales (to determine if trainees can work unsupervised) for EPAs had been proposed, they had not been validated — until now. Two new studies, one involving fellows and the other involving general pediatric residents, shed light on the best uses of EPAs.

CREATING SUPERVISORY SCALES FOR PEDIATRIC FELLOWS

In a study led by Richard B. Mink, MD, MACM, and conducted by the Subspecialty Pediatrics Investigator Network (SPIN), researchers created…

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