81 - Pediatrics Supporting Parents: Creation and Implementation of an Early Relational Health Scavenger Hunt in Pediatric Primary Care

Publication Number: 2077.81

Eujin Chung, Duke University, Frisco, TX, United States; Tiffany Solomon, Durham Pediatrics Supporting Parents, Durham, NC, United States; Danielle Alese Cooke. Little, Pediatrics Supporting Parents, Durham, NC, United States; Debra Best, Duke University School of Medicine, Durham, NC, United States; Elizabeth Erickson, Duke University School of Medicine, Durham, NC, United States

Background: Pediatrics Supporting Parents (PSP) is a national initiative to transform pediatric care to promote early social-emotional development (SED) and foster parent-child relationships. One of PSP’s community partnerships is the Durham Partners for Early Relational Health (DPERH). DPERH is a network of Duke pediatricians, community experts, and parent partners that implements novel practices to support PSP’s goals in a community-informed manner.

Objective: To create an Early Relational Health Scavenger Hunt (ERHSH) that promotes practices for early childhood SED and amplifies the experience of pediatric visits at the Duke Children's Primary Care Clinic in North Durham.

Design/Methods: DPERH is composed of community rooted leaders, pediatricians, and student interns. PSP created the ERHSH as a novel approach to wait times during pediatric visits at the clinic. The group created English and Spanish scavenger hunts for three age groups (See Image 1). Age-appropriate activities encourage collaboration between the child and caregiver(s) to promote SED and demonstrate models of positive parenting that can be replicated at home. Children can exchange a completed scavenger hunt for a token to use at the clinic’s free book vending machine. Parents are encouraged to provide feedback on the activity via a QR code to a survey on the back of the ERHSH.

Results: The ERHSH was successfully launched in November of 2024 and is now being offered to tens of patients daily. The scavenger hunts are printed on paper and placed at parent resource walls of four clinic areas. Clinic staff and PSP interns promote the scavenger hunt in clinic and support families in the use of the book vending machine. PSP interns restock the scavenger hunts and iteratively edit the activities as necessary. Since the launch, clinic staff have observed family enthusiasm about the ERHSH and calmer waiting rooms.

Conclusion(s): The ERHSH is unique as it takes advantage of wait times during pediatric visits. In contrast to typical pediatric appointments, the ERHSH provides holistic support to families, at every point of the visit, by providing models of child engagement that may be replicated at home, propagating the ERHSH’s aims to improve SED and early relational health. Future directions include in-clinic observations to quantify and qualitatively evaluate the use of the ERHSH. Furthermore, responses on the feedback form should be analyzed to understand the impact of the ERHSH and iteratively use community feedback for improving scavenger hunt activities.

Early Relational Health Scavenger Hunts
Scavenger Hunts.pdfScavenger hunts are offered in English and Spanish.