Issues Related to Laboratory Screening for Children and Adolescents Entering Foster Care.

Abstract

* Abbreviation: AAP — : American Academy of Pediatrics The article by Greiner et al1 entitled “Laboratory Screening for Children Entering Foster Care” in the current issue is the first study in which researchers explore the application of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommended laboratory screening guidelines for children entering foster care. Those guidelines, “Fostering Health: Health Care for Children and Adolescents in Foster Care,”2 were first developed in the state of New York by a 20-person expert panel and were later endorsed by the AAP’s Task Force on Foster Care in 20053 and reiterated in the latest AAP Policy Statement.4 Expert consensus was the only approach available in the absence of evidence about what constitutes quality health care for this population of underserved children with special health care needs. Given the absence of evidence to the contrary, the guidelines remain the standard today. The “Fostering Health” guidelines were developed on the heels of the crack cocaine epidemic for those at high risk for vertically and horizontally transmitted infections but who mostly lack health records.2 Children of all ages were considered to be at risk given the rates of disclosed and/or suspected sexual abuse, the high prevalence of … Address correspondence to Moira Szilagyi, MD, PhD, Department of Pediatrics, University of California, Los Angeles, 300 UCLA Medical Plaza, Los Angeles, CA 90095. E-mail: mszilagyi{at}mednet.ucla.edu