July 9, 2020: Because All We Have Is Each Other: Why Kids Need Effective Advocates. Ben Hoffman, MD, CPST-1, FAAP, professor of Pediatrics, Division of General Pediatrics School of Medicine, OHSU; medical Director, Tom Sargent Safety Center; director, Oregon Center for Children and Youth with Special Health Needs.
July 16, 2020: Two-Eyed Seeing: Recognizing and Responding to the Cultural Needs of Indigenous Children During Rehabilitation. Molly Fuentes, MD, MS; assistant professor, Rehabilitation Medicine Seattle Children’s and University of Washington. Read full post »
Seattle Children’s is increasing in-person appointments and is ready to see your patients. To partner with and support PCPs, we are continuing to update our referral guidelines and resources including many new algorithms to help assess and manage patients’ conditions. Learn more.
Our Capacity
- ALL Seattle Children’s locations are open for in-person appointments, with just two exceptions: Outpatient Psychiatry and Behavioral Medicine Clinic at Overlake and South Sound Cardiology (SSC) in Centralia are still temporarily closed (SSC Federal Way, Silverdale and Tacoma are open).
- We are returning to normal ambulatory volumes. We expect to be back to 80+% of our normal ambulatory volumes by the end of June and hope to further expand capacity in the following months.
- Our Urgent Cares are open and have capacity, both for appointments and COVID-19 testing. Patients can schedule an appointment online or just walk in.
- We are encouraging families to get the care they need, either in-person or through telehealth appointments. We are proactively contacting families to schedule new and follow-up visits, but also encourage families to contact us to schedule since we often are unable to reach them.
Read full post »
We are writing to acknowledge the tragic acts of violence and racism happening across our country.
The senseless killings of Ahmaud Arbery in Georgia, Breonna Taylor in Kentucky, and George Floyd in Minnesota leave us sickened and heartbroken. While we share our grief with these families and their communities, we must also acknowledge with sorrow our region’s own history of racially motivated violence, discrimination, and marginalization.
These recent events are set against the backdrop and acute pain of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has disproportionately impacted communities of color in the United States. Added to the burden of this crisis are the magnifying health and economic disparities, which are due to systemic racism and social injustices that have existed for far too long across generations.
These are the moments we cannot be silent—and Seattle Children’s will speak out, oppose racism, and advance our commitment to equity, diversity and inclusion. We are all affected negatively when one part of our community is burdened by racism and violence, and we are all part of the solution. Read full post »
Seattle Children’s is now processing all COVID-19 tests in-house. Turnaround times are as follows:
- If your patient uses the Sand Point Learning Center drive-through testing site, you will receive same-day results.
- If your patient uses a regional urgent care clinic, you will receive results the same day or by 10 a.m. the next day. Samples that do not make same-day runs in microbiology will be on the 6 a.m. run the following day. (The last run of each day is at 6 p.m.)
As a reminder, we will send test results only to the referring provider, not to patient families directly (except for tests ordered by Seattle Children’s). Find more details about our community testing on our COVID-19 testing page.
COVID-19 Testing Update as of Tuesday, June 2: we have tested 4,224 patients, with 39 positive and 9 inconclusive, for an overall positivity rate of 1.1%.
Read full post »
Dr. Paul Merguerian is division chief of Urology at Seattle Children’s and the Dr. Michael Mitchell Endowed Chair in Pediatric Urology.
Antenatal Hydronephrosis
How much of a problem is antenatal hydronephrosis?
Dr. Merguerian: Hydronephrosis is the most common condition found on antenatal ultrasound. It’s estimated to affect 1 fetus in 100. That said, about 75% of cases are not clinically significant and can simply be observed — which is important for physicians to be aware of and also potentially reassuring to parents who’ve been told their child has this condition. More than half of cases are physiologic and resolve on their own by birth or soon after. Most mild and moderate hydronephrosis never harms the kidneys.
What’s essential for both primary care providers (PCPs) and urologists is to identify infants who do need to be monitored or referred to a specialist and who might require intervention. Read full post »
The Neurodevelopmental program has updated its referral guidelines to clarify what services the clinic does and doesn’t offer and how best to refer patients for a successful first visit. Current wait times for first appointments are approximately six months.
Neurodevelopmental hopes its new referral guidelines will help patients to be seen in a timelier manner and be directed to the provider at Seattle Children’s or elsewhere who will best meet their needs. They stress the importance of submitting a referral that is complete in order to help the family’s first visit go smoothly and be as productive as possible. A complete referral includes the following documents, when available:
- Therapy reports (occupational therapy, physical therapy, speech) and early intervention notes
- Questionnaires (M-CHAT, Ages and Stages, Vanderbilt ADHD Diagnostic Rating Scale and other applicable rating scales and/or questionnaires)
- School records or notes, individualized education plan (IEP) or testing results, developmental assessments
- Brain imaging reports
Read full post »
From Seattle Children’s On the Pulse blog
Eighteen months ago, Dr. Lynn Martin, an anesthesiologist and medical director of the ambulatory surgery center at Seattle Children’s, and his colleagues at the Seattle Children’s Bellevue Clinic and Surgery Center set out to reduce the use of opioids during outpatient pediatric surgeries while maintaining or improving pain management and outcomes for patients. Ultimately, they accomplished much more by successfully ousting opioid use during surgeries.
Dr. Lynn Martin
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), drug overdose deaths continue to increase in the United States. It is a problem Martin and his colleagues believe they can help address, which is what drove them to develop a novel initiative at Seattle Children’s to reduce opioids.
Martin and his colleagues completed their breakthrough quality improvement initiative to reduce opioid use, and their findings were published in Anesthesia and Analgesia. Read full post »
For many patients undergoing treatment for cancer, there is not just the immediate worry about beating the disease but also the longer-term prospect of surviving the harsh side effects of the drugs that saved them. Almost five years ago, On the Pulse featured a clinical trial led by Dr. Todd Cooper to study the safety and efficacy of a cancer drug called CPX-351. Cooper and his team wanted to find out if CPX-351 could help young cancer patients survive their disease without the long-term cardiac damage so often caused by other drugs. Read full post »
More than 50 research studies to understand, detect, treat and prevent the coronavirus in children and families have launched at Seattle Children’s since the virus emerged in late 2019. Our weekly On the Pulse blog series, called “Quest(ion) for Discovery,” highlights research in progress and the search for answers that could result in major scientific breakthroughs that save lives and slow the spread of the virus.
Recent posts:
Read full post »
Childhood vaccinations plummeted after COVID-19 was declared a national emergency. The New York Times reported that the administration of measles, mumps and rubella shots dropped by 50% between the week of February 16 (pre-COVID-19) and the week of April 5; diphtheria and whooping cough shots dropped by 42% and human papilloma virus (HPV) vaccines by 73% during the same period.
Seattle Children’s is participating in a public education campaign by the Washington State Hospital Association (WSHA) to encourage people to get care when they need it, including well-child checks and vaccinations for children. Read full post »
