282 - Implementing Play Promotion in Pediatric Primary Care: Lessons from the Prescription for Play Learning Collaborative

Publication Number: 1268.282

Rebecca LE. Tavernier, Weitzman Institute, Middletown, CT, United States; Claire Newby, Weitzman Institute, Bloomington, MN, United States; Julia Karlin, Creighton University School of Medicine, Wilmington, NC, United States; Shelby Anderson-Badbade, Weitzman Institute, Moses-Weitzman Health System, Durham, NC, United States; Mark Splaine, Weitzman Institute, Moses Weitzman Health System, Mount Pleasant, SC, United States; Ho-Choong Chang, Yale School of Medicine, New Haven, CT, United States; Maya Moody, Weitzman, St Louis, MO, United States; Mandy Lamb, Moses Weitzman Health System, Middletown, CT, United States

Background: Although play is a vital component of healthy child development, play promotion in healthcare is often overlooked. The Prescription for Play (P4P) program seeks to fill this gap by training providers to promote play in well-child visits for children aged 18-36 months. The program provides free play kits and resources to help providers and caregivers foster early child development through play. To bolster providers’ abilities to effectively implement P4P, we launched the P4P Learning Collaborative (LC) as a quality improvement (QI) initiative.

Objective: To document effective strategies for recruitment, engagement, and collaboration with healthcare providers nationwide, a process evaluation of the P4P LC was conducted.

Design/Methods: Twenty organizations participated in the P4P LC. Participating organizations designated site coordinators and provider champions (N=50) responsible for implementing P4P, attending monthly meetings, and completing assignments. Six synchronous learning sessions, designed and executed by subject matter experts (SME), occurred monthly from February to July 2024. Learning sessions included instructing participants on the use of aims statements, flowcharts, data collection and display methods, and implementing practice changes using Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) cycles. Participants completed individualized coach calls with SMEs and QI assignments corresponding with P4P implementation.

Results: Participating organizations consisted of 65% federally qualified health centers or look-a-likes, 5% private practices, and 30% health systems. Organizations were geographically diverse, spanning 14 states, with 45% in rural, 25% in suburban, and 30% in urban areas. The monthly learning sessions averaged 33 attendees (66%), and SMEs conducted 32 private coaching sessions with 16 unique organizations (80%). Fifteen organizations (75%) submitted QI assignments and 10 (50%) achieved full program fidelity, with an additional 5 organizations (25%) achieving partial fidelity. Session evaluation data showed high participant satisfaction.

Conclusion(s): The P4P LC actively engaged healthcare organizations in implementing a play-promotion program through expert guidance and collaborative learning. Participating organizations expressed feeling empowered within this collaborative environment, which fostered the development of innovative ideas and facilitated implementation of P4P in a majority of participating sites. The P4P LC demonstrates the power of engaging healthcare teams in collaborative learning to support the delivery of play promotion programs.