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BODYCAST - THE OFFICIAL JOURNAL OF THE CSOT Pediatric casting: By Jacob Lookabill, OCT, WFBMC Going to the doctor can be scary for children- and even for many adults. When children visit a medical clinic, whether for a fracture, treatment of a birth defect, or injections, they automatically think it is going to be painful. Andrew Koman, MD, a nationally known physician, leads the orthopaedic department at the Comprehensive Rehabilitation Center. Dr. Koman was the first physician in the world to use botulinum toxin to treat upper extremity spasticity in cerebral palsy patients. He leads a great group of pediatric physicians, including Jeffrey Shilt, MD. When Dr. Shilt arrived at the center, the fist thing he said to me was, "Your team will be my bad guys." He likes to gain his patients' trust by being the "good guy," so he leaves all of the painful procedures to us. At first I thought this would be a big problem. How could children trust us if we hurt them? So, the team went to work to find a way to make things easier for children in the casting room. First, we had to get on their level. About the same time Dr. Shilt came on board, we were adjusting to a new facility, which created a great opportunity for u, to design a state-of-the-art casting room. The pediatric room has a TV-DVD-VCR combo, a mural, posters, Beaver Steve. a radio, a picture area and floor-to-ceiling windows so the children can see out (see sidebar). These features help distract and relax our patients. Our team of orthopaedic technologists has compiled a list of conversation topics that appeal to most of our patients and help us speak with them on their level. We have all ages of children in our clinic daily, so we suggest adapting your topics according to age. For the younger children we may talk about cartoons (i.e., Bob the Builder or Clifford). With the older children, we may use SpongeBob SquarePants, school, or love interests as topics of conversation. Remember, even when we may be feeling bad or when we do not feel like being at work, our patients still depend on us. Do whatever it takes to make your patients more relaxed. Take the time to get to know them in some way, treat them like people and not children, carry on conversation, and do your best to keep their minds off what you are doing. Make sure you explain to them what their procedure will entail, and maintain eye contact with them as often as possible. If you can get on their level, your patients will be comfortable and your job will be a little easier.
This abstract is a portion of the article
which appears in the Fall 2008 issue of BodyCast.
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