During a health care visit, play allows a Child Life Specialist to learn about children in order to assist them with their experience in a positive way. Some children are too young to express their feelings using words. Child Life helps them do this through play. Emotional Support Child Life coaches families in times of stress and worry by supporting parents and siblings. Family is very important.
Parents know their child best and are the core of a child s health care team.
The Child Life Specialist communicates daily with the medical staff about how children and their families seem to be coping with their health care experience using a team approach. Normalization Child Life strives to make the health care experience as normal as possible by helping to maintain the schedule or routine that a child follows at home. Siblings The Child Life Specialist will provide information on reactions that siblings may have during hospitalization of a brother or sister and suggest ways to improve communication. School Visits Child Life can make the transition of returning to school smoother for patients who have had a lengthy stay at the hospital or who have suffered injury or illness causing life changes. This program provides a developmentally appropriate explanation of the illness, how it affected the patient, and what classmates can do to help.