Changes in body mass index and behavioral health among adolescents in military families during the COVID-19 pandemic: a retrospective cohort study

BACKGROUND

Widely published findings from the COVID-19 pandemic show adverse effects on body mass index (BMI) and behavioral health in both adults and children, due to factors such as illness, job loss, and limited opportunity for physical and social activity. This study investigated whether these adverse effects were mitigated in adolescents from military families, who are universally insured with consistent access to healthcare, and who generally have at least one parent who must adhere to physical and mental fitness as a condition of employment.

METHODS

We conducted a cohort study using two groups of adolescents receiving care in the U.S. Military Health System during the COVID-19 pandemic; one for changes in Body Mass Index (BMI) and the second for changes in behavioral health diagnoses, using TRICARE claims data. Beneficiaries (160,037) ages 13 to 15 years in fiscal years 2017-2018, were followed up during October 2020 to June 2021.

RESULTS

Among the BMI cohort, 44.32% of underweight adolescents moved to healthy weight, 28.48% from overweight to obese, and 3.7% from healthy weight to underweight. Prevalence of behavioral disorders showed an overall 29.01% percent increase during the study period, which included in mood (86.75%) and anxiety (86.49%) disorders, suicide ideation (42.69%), and suicide attempts (77.23%). Decreases in percent change were observed in conduct disorders (-15.93%) and ADD/ADHD (-8.61%).

CONCLUSIONS

Adolescents in military families experienced adverse health outcomes during the pandemic at approximately the same rates as those in non-military families, suggesting that universal insurance and military culture were not significantly mitigating factors. Obesity and underweight present significant opportunities to intervene in areas such as exercise and food access. Decreased conduct disorders and ADD/ADHD may reflect lower prevalence due to favorable home environment, or lower rates of diagnosis and referral; however, increased rates of anxiety, mood disorders, suicide ideation and attempt are especially concerning. Care should be taken to ensure that adolescents receive consistent opportunity for physical activity and social interaction, and those at risk for suicide should receive active monitoring and appropriate referral to behavioral healthcare providers.

Preventing Home Medication Administration Errors

Medication administration errors that take place in the home are common, especially when liquid preparations are used and complex medication schedules with multiple medications are involved; children with chronic conditions are disproportionately affected. Parents and other caregivers with low health literacy and/or limited English proficiency are at higher risk for making errors in administering medications to children in their care. Recommended strategies to reduce home medication errors relate to provider prescribing practices; health literacy-informed verbal counseling strategies (eg, teachback and showback) and written patient education materials (eg, pictographic information) for patients and/or caregivers across settings (inpatient, outpatient, emergency care, pharmacy); dosing-tool provision for liquid medication measurement; review of medication lists with patients and/or caregivers (medication reconciliation) that includes prescription and over-the-counter medications, as well as vitamins and supplements; leveraging the medical home; engaging adolescents and their adult caregivers; training of providers; safe disposal of medications; regulations related to medication dosing tools, labeling, packaging, and informational materials; use of electronic health records and other technologies; and research to identify novel ways to support safe home medication administration.

Child Health As A National Security Issue: Obesity And Behavioral Health Conditions Among Military Children

To build and maintain an effective, agile force that is ready at a moment's notice to deploy for national security missions, the US military must recruit approximately 150,000 new personnel annually while adhering to stringent medical standards. Given a target recruitment population of young adults ages 18-24, the health of the nation's children is critical to US national security. Maintaining a fit population of military dependents is particularly important because this group has a greater propensity to serve than does the broader population of US children. Using TRICARE claims, we examined body mass index and behavioral health diagnoses among adolescents ages 13-18 covered by the Military Health System for fiscal years 2017-18. Prevalence of conduct disorders, which prevent enlistment, was low overall. However, overweight and obesity combined prevalence estimates were more than 30 percent in every census division, and the prevalence of behavioral health disorders ranged from 18.53 percent to 22.90 percent. These prevalence rates are similar to those found in the civilian sector but are high enough to pose barriers to the military's efforts to meet recruitment goals. Interventions to improve nutrition, fitness, and behavioral health among school-age children may improve fitness to serve and guarantee the future readiness of the armed forces and the security of the nation.

Principles of Pediatric Patient Safety: Reducing Harm Due to Medical Care

Pediatricians render care in an increasingly complex environment, which results in multiple opportunities to cause unintended harm. National awareness of patient safety risks has grown since the National Academy of Medicine (formerly the Institute of Medicine) published its report "To Err Is Human: Building a Safer Health System" in 1999. Patients and society as a whole continue to challenge health care providers to examine their practices and implement safety solutions. The depth and breadth of harm incurred by the practice of medicine is still being defined as reports continue to reveal a variety of avoidable errors, from those that involve specific high-risk medications to those that are more generalizable, such as patient misidentification and diagnostic error. Pediatric health care providers in all practice environments benefit from having a working knowledge of patient safety language. Pediatric providers should serve as advocates for best practices and policies with the goal of attending to risks that are unique to children, identifying and supporting a culture of safety, and leading efforts to eliminate avoidable harm in any setting in which medical care is rendered to children. In this Policy Statement, we provide an update to the 2011 Policy Statement "Principles of Pediatric Patient Safety: Reducing Harm Due to Medical Care."

Pediatric Readiness in the Emergency Department

This is a revision of the previous joint Policy Statement titled "Guidelines for Care of Children in the Emergency Department." Children have unique physical and psychosocial needs that are heightened in the setting of serious or life-threatening emergencies. The majority of children who are ill and injured are brought to community hospital emergency departments (EDs) by virtue of proximity. It is therefore imperative that all EDs have the appropriate resources (medications, equipment, policies, and education) and capable staff to provide effective emergency care for children. In this Policy Statement, we outline the resources necessary for EDs to stand ready to care for children of all ages. These recommendations are consistent with the recommendations of the Institute of Medicine (now called the National Academy of Medicine) in its report "The Future of Emergency Care in the US Health System." Although resources within emergency and trauma care systems vary locally, regionally, and nationally, it is essential that ED staff, administrators, and medical directors seek to meet or exceed these recommendations to ensure that high-quality emergency care is available for all children. These updated recommendations are intended to serve as a resource for clinical and administrative leadership in EDs as they strive to improve their readiness for children of all ages.

Advocating for Life Support Training of Children, Parents, Caregivers, School Personnel, and the Public

Pediatric cardiac arrest in the out-of-hospital setting is a traumatic event for family, friends, caregivers, classmates, and school personnel. Immediate bystander cardiopulmonary resuscitation and the use of automatic external defibrillators have been shown to improve survival in adults. There is some evidence to show improved survival in children who receive immediate bystander cardiopulmonary resuscitation. Pediatricians, in their role as advocates to improve the health of all children, are uniquely positioned to strongly encourage the training of children, parents, caregivers, school personnel, and the lay public in the provision of basic life support, including pediatric basic life support, as well as the appropriate use of automated external defibrillators.

Pediatric Medication Safety in the Emergency Department

Pediatric patients cared for in emergency departments (EDs) are at high risk of medication errors for a variety of reasons. A multidisciplinary panel was convened by the Emergency Medical Services for Children program and the American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Pediatric Emergency Medicine to initiate a discussion on medication safety in the ED. Top opportunities identified to improve medication safety include using kilogram-only weight-based dosing, optimizing computerized physician order entry by using clinical decision support, developing a standard formulary for pediatric patients while limiting variability of medication concentrations, using pharmacist support within EDs, enhancing training of medical professionals, systematizing the dispensing and administration of medications within the ED, and addressing challenges for home medication administration before discharge.

A New Era in Quality Measurement: The Development and Application of Quality Measures

Quality measures are used for a variety of purposes in health care, including clinical care improvement, regulation, accreditation, public reporting, surveillance, and maintenance of certification. Most quality measures are 1 of 3 types: structure, process, or outcome. Health care quality measures should address the domains of quality across the continuum of care and reflect patient and family experience. Measure development for pediatric health care has a number of important challenges, including gaps in the evidence base; the fact that measures for most conditions must be age-specific; the long, resource-intensive development process; and the national focus on measure development for adult conditions. Numerous national organizations focus on the development and application of quality measures, including the Pediatric Quality Measures Program, which is focused solely on the development and implementation of pediatric-specific measures. Once a quality measure is developed for use in national measurement programs, the organization that develops and/or "stewards" the measure may submit the measure or set of measures for endorsement, which is recognition of the scientific soundness, usability, and relevance of the measure. Quality measures must then be disseminated and applied to improve care. Although pediatric health care providers and child health care institutions alike must continually balance time and resources needed to address multiple reporting requirements, quality measurement is an important tool for advancing high-quality and safe health care for children. This policy statement provides an overview of quality measurement and describes the opportunities for pediatric health care providers to apply quality measures to improve clinical quality and performance in the delivery of pediatric health care services.

Overview of the federal home visiting program

On March 23, 2010, the President signed into law the Affordable Care Act (Public Law 111-148), which included an amendment of Title V of the Social Security Act authorizing the creation of the Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV) program. Authorized and funded at $1.5 billion for 5 years, the MIECHV represents a large investment in health and development outcomes for at-risk children through evidence-based home visiting programs. The MIECHV presents unprecedented opportunities to integrate early childhood services systems, not only on the federal level but also within states and local communities. The MIECHV is funded in escalating amounts over 5-year period authorized, as follows: $100 million in fiscal year (FY) 2010, $250 million in FY 2011, $350 million in FY 2012, $400 million in FY 2013, and $400 million in FY 2014. Most of the funding is being provided to states and territories to provide home visiting services in their at-risk communities. In addition, the legislation included a 3% set-aside for tribes, tribal organizations, and urban Indian organizations and a 3% set-aside for research and evaluation. This investment has spurred the creation of more comprehensive and coordinated early childhood service systems across the United States. This article provides an overview of the MIECHV program, including descriptions of the various requirements under the Affordable Care Act. These include partnering with states to provide evidence-based home visiting services to at-risk families, working with tribal communities to implement culturally competent home visiting programs, and developing a mechanism to systematically review the evidence of effectiveness for home visiting program models and to conduct a national evaluation of the MIECHV program.

A comparison of the initial to the later stream urine in children catheterized to evaluate for a urinary tract infection

BACKGROUND

To avoid potential contamination, it is recommended that the first few drops of urine be discarded when obtaining a catheterized urine sample from a child being evaluated for a urinary tract infection (UTI). The existing evidence to make such a recommendation is scant. Our goal, therefore, was to determine whether the urinalysis, Gram stain, and culture results were significantly different from the initial and later urine samples collected from catheterized children.

METHODS

A prospective diagnostic discrimination between early and later urine samples was conducted on a convenience sample of pediatric patients being evaluated for a UTI in an urban emergency department. Results of the urinalysis, Gram stain, and quantitative culture were compared between the early and later stream urine samples.

RESULTS

Data from 86 children were analyzed. Four of 80 patients had a false identification of low colony count bacteruria from the early but not from the later stream. For patients with negative cultures, the early stream was also more likely to falsely identify > or =5 wbc/hpf (P<0.01) or bacteruria (P<0.05) on urinalysis than the later stream.

CONCLUSIONS

There is a small but potentially meaningful contamination of the early stream urine compared with the later stream in young children catheterized to evaluate for a urinary tract infection.