Editor's Note: Every March is Child Life Month, which is a wonderful spotlight for awareness on the field of Child Life. As part of our celebration, More Than Medicine will "spotlight" child life specialists from various areas of Le Bonheur Children's. Today's post marks our first with a look at our wonderful inpatient child life specialist.

By Jamie Droke
Child Life Specialist

In honor of National Child Life Month (March), we are taking the opportunity to remind everyone of the many different areas of the hospital our department covers. For anyone who has ever had an encounter with someone from our team, you might not be aware that we cover in so many different areas. In fact, it is probably true that some staff members at Le Bonheur are unable to name all of the different areas where we work. And that is okay, because the important thing is that each specialist is known by the staff in that area and is well integrated as a member of the team. However, it is also helpful and good to know that we cover so many different areas. And the truth of the matter is, child life looks very different depending on the area in which you cover. So for the month of March, we will look at each different type of area we cover, starting today with the inpatient specialists.

Each of our inpatient units is covered each weekday by a Certified Child Life Specialist. These specialists work to promote coping and reduce stress for patients and their families throughout hospital admissions. In addition, child life specialists recognize the need for normal activities and peer interactions while in the hospital and facilitate opportunities for normalization and socialization.

These specialists spend a lot of their time providing

• Preparation for procedures
• Distraction during procedures
• Emotional support
• Therapeutic play
• Therapeutic art
• Medical play
• New diagnosis teaching
• Developmental stimulation
• Developmental assessment

Since our units are organized by diagnosis and child life specialists cover by unit, each specialist has a few diagnoses in which they are extremely well versed. For example, the specialist who covers the neurology floor (7th) is our expert on brain tumors, but not on asthma. And the specialist who covers the respiratory floor (11th) is our expert on asthma, but not on brain tumors. Each specialist has a list of several procedures or diagnoses they spend a lot of time dealing with, but all of the inpatient specialists spend a lot of their time providing things on the list above. As you will see in the weeks to come, this list is slightly different than the list for outpatient specialists or specialists in critical care. In the meantime, Happy Child Life Month!!!