Family-centered pediatric perioperative care.

FAMILY-CENTERED care is an approach to the planning and delivery of health care that is based on partnerships among patients, families, healthcare providers, and hospitals. Family-centered care encourages a collaborative, team approach that respects individual and family strengths, cultures, traditions, and expertise. Providing care in a family-centered way honors the involvement of the patient, family, and informal caregivers and improves outcomes by encouraging communication among all stakeholders, enhancing coordination and promoting integration of medical care. Despite the attention to family-centered care in specialties such as pediatrics, neonatology, and emergency medicine, there has been very little integrated literature on this unique approach to patient care in anesthesiology. Although there are studies within the field that may fall into the general rubric of family-centered care, guidelines and policy statements have not been developed. Thus, the purpose of this Clinical Concept and Commentary article is to promote the philosophy of family-centered care in anesthesiology by providing a practical and clinically relevant model of delivering pediatric perioperative care in a family-centered manner. The basic message is that families are an integral part of the perioperative care team and should be treated as such. Efforts should be made to establish collaborations by openly communicating, developing a shared vision for the care of the child, and building a cohesive care team that includes healthcare providers and family members throughout the perioperative period.