The new room is specifically designed to avoid these pitfalls. Now youngsters who come in to the SFGH Emergency Department will be taken directly to the pediatric room through a separate hallway, bypassing the waiting room and treatment areas where adults receive care. The room also will be equipped with a television set, video-cassette recorder, and compact disc player with headphones to help distract a child from the unsettling experience of receiving emergency treatment. The room also is designed so family members can be present during treatment to provide valuable emotional support, which can aid in the healing process, Dieckmann said. We have to view the injured child as the injured family.
Family members are part of the biological system and are key to pain and stress management.
Caregivers measure the child's height, and based on the corresponding color, choose the right piece of equipment or right medication from the matching color-coded drawer. SFGH pioneered the pediatric cart, which is now widely used in hospitals nationwide. It gets past the business of doing memorization or calculations of sizes and doses in a crisis. Children who receive emergency treatment also will have access to appropriate pain medications under SFGH's model pediatric pain policy. But he added, experience has shown that when properly administered, pain medications can greatly ease the treatment process for children, as well as their parents and providers.