State Child Research Articles

The Assessment and Management of Biliary Atresia in Hawai'i, 2009-2023.

Although biliary atresia (BA) is a rare neonatal disorder, it remains the leading cause of pediatric end-stage liver disease. Early diagnosis of BA and treatment with the Kasai procedure can significantly reduce the need for pediatric liver transplant. Current data suggests that performing the Kasai procedure at 30-45 days of life is associated with longer native liver survival rates and reduction of the need for liver transplant. The incidence rate of BA in the state of Hawai'i is nearly double the incidence rate in the continental US. International studies have demonstrated that screening programs for BA reduce the age at diagnosis and treatment. However, there has been no statewide analysis on the ages at diagnosis or at Kasai, nor does a statewide screening program for BA exist. The purpose of this study is to review the age of diagnosis and treatment of BA to determine if the current practice in Hawai'i is in line with the published data. A retrospective chart review of all patients diagnosed with BA at the state's primary children's hospital was performed (2009-2023) and 19 patients who underwent the Kasai procedure were identified. The mean age at diagnosis is 71.4 days (n=19) and the mean age at Kasai procedure is 72.0 days (n=19). Both the average age at diagnosis and treatment for BA in Hawai'i is significantly higher than published data suggesting best outcomes at 30-45 days of life. This review suggests that the implementation of a statewide screening program for BA in Hawai'i is warranted.

Medicaid Dental Benefits for Pregnant People and Dental Care Use Among Very Young Children.

The aim of this study was to examine the association between Medicaid dental benefits for pregnant people and dental care use among very young children in Medicaid. We hypothesized that children living in states with more generous dental benefits for Medicaid-enrolled pregnant people would be more likely to have a recent dental visit. This national cross-sectional study used pooled2017-2019 data from the National Survey of Children's Health, as well as state Medicaid policy data. The study sample included children aged 0-2 enrolled in Medicaid. Multivariable logistic regression models estimated the association between Medicaid dental benefit generosity for pregnant people and the child having a dental visit in the past year. Children in states with emergency-only dental coverage for pregnant people were 2.5 times as likely to have had a dental visit than children in states with extensive coverage (OR 2.48, 95% CI 1.35-4.53). In supplemental analyses excluding children living in Texas, there was no longer an association between dental coverage for pregnant people and dental utilization among young children (OR 1.52, 95% CI 0.82-2.83). Young children in states that provided emergency-only dental benefits for pregnant people in Medicaid had significantly higher odds of dental utilization than young children in states with more generous dental benefits for pregnant people. This relationship disappeared after excluding the state Texas, which had the highest rate of child dental utilization in the country and provided emergency-only dental benefits for pregnant people in Medicaid.

Evaluasi Pembinaan Program Anak Penyandang Kesejahteraan Sosial di Kampung Anak Negeri Dinas Sosial Kota Surabaya

Policy program evaluation is a systematic process for evaluating the effectiveness, efficiency, relevance and impact of a government policy or program. The main objective is to understand the extent to which the program or policy has succeeded in achieving its objectives, as well as to identify areas of improvement or adjustments needed. Policy evaluation is a step important in a sustainable public policy cycle, helping to ensure that policies can provide maximum benefits for the community. The State Children's Village is a program designed by the Surabaya City Social Service to provide services and protection to children who are in need and have social problems in their area. Evaluation of the development program for children with social welfare in the Surabaya City Social Service's State Children's Village was carried out comprehensively to ensure the effectiveness and positive impact of the program. The State Children's Village Program is an initiative of the Surabaya City Social Service which aims to provide guidance and assistance to children who suffer from social welfare. need, especially those who are considered recipients of social welfare or have social problems. This program focuses on developing children through training, coaching and mentoring so that they can live better, more humanely, and learn to behave normally. Through a comprehensive evaluation, the coaching program Kampung Anak Negeri can ensure that efforts to develop children in the city of Surabaya really have a significant impact in improving their welfare and creating better conditions for future generations.

Academic Medicine and Rural Health System Partnerships: Enhancing Education While Advancing Physician Workforce Priorities.

A worsening shortage of rural physicians paralleling increasing health disparities demands attention. Past and ongoing efforts to address this shortage have had positive effects and can inform new strategies to achieve even greater impact. Interventions have included the development of regional medical school campuses and rural-focused tracks to recruit medical students from rural areas, expansion of rural-based graduate medical education (GME) programs and tracks, and use of institutional and individual financial incentives for rural-based training and/or practice. National policy has also taken aim at this challenge with provisions aimed at expanding rural GME in the Medicare, Medicaid, and State Children's Health Insurance Program Balanced Budget Refinement Act of 1999 and the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021. Additionally, several states have funded growth in GME, and supportive pathways for Medicare reimbursement and for Veterans Administration funding have been implemented. The authors recommend a new strategy for bolstering the rural physician workforce, focused on using academic-rural partnerships to incorporate rural rotations as a routine part of GME. They explain how the current health care landscape supports this approach and outline additional steps toward implementation. Centralized data collection and analysis are noted as essential to guide future efforts.

Nutritional Status and Lifestyle Patterns among Primary School Pupils in Edo State, Nigeria: Implications for Health Promotion

Childhood nutrition and lifestyle patterns play a critical role in shaping the health and development of individuals, laying the foundation for a healthy adulthood. In Nigeria, Edo State faces a dual burden of malnutrition, with pockets of undernutrition coexisting with the rising prevalence of childhood obesity. This cross-sectional study assessed the nutritional status of primary school pupils in the State and explored lifestyle factors such as dietary habits and physical activity. Data were collected on 1805 pupils from sixteen randomly selected schools through anthropometric measurements and Administration Food Consumption Pattern Questionnaires. These data were analysed using SPSS version 23 and presented using frequency distributions, percentage distributions, mean, standard deviations, and chi-square. The study revealed that 77.0% of the respondents exhibited normal nutritional status, indicating a satisfactory outcome for a significant proportion of the school-age population. However, there was a worrisome prevalence of over-nutrition, with 14% of the pupils classified as obese 10.0% extreme tallness. Regarding dietary habits, most pupils reported consuming three meals a day, but a significant proportion relied on carbohydrate-rich foods, raising concerns about the nutritional adequacy of their diets. Regarding physical activity, a higher proportion of respondents engaged in activities during school hours, but participation was low after the school period. The study underscored the importance of addressing over-nutrition and promoting balanced diets and physical activity among primary school pupils in Edo State, Nigeria. Effective health promotion strategies must consider lifestyle preferences to improve the health and well-being of this vulnerable population to ensure a healthier future for Edo State's children

Locating the Process of Policy Change to Empower Youth Care Leavers as Inheritors of State Property in India

To ensure the continuum of care to be sustainable and of participatory quality for orphaned/ abandoned children and youth without parental care or those residing in institutional care, there is an urgent requirement of policy shift and extension in the aftercare of the youth sphere. These children must be conferred with rights-based privilege and responsibilities by the federal government in the management of state resources and property as their guardians and carers. This policy and programme shift would formally recognise these youth care-leavers (YCLs) as wards of state, provide them with employment and income sources and grant them legal inheritance rights to public property. This policy reform entails provision of legal identity on the care-leavers as state's children, prior training in vocational skills, harnessing of life-skills, and management capabilities and linking them to public institutions for life beyond aftercare. The authors advocate for the states of India to widen their scope and include 'those in care of the State' as leaders and change agents in resource management through a proposed right to inheritance. This would pave the way for inclusion and equality of the marginalised and stigmatised population cohorts, in this case the YCLs, and yield demographic dividend for the country.

State-level policies and reunification: A multi-level survival analysis

BackgroundA growing body of research has focused on the relationships of policies and other macro factors and child welfare outcomes. However, to date, few studies have examined state child welfare policies and reunification, despite reunification being the priority case goal among children in foster care. ObjectiveThis study examined the relationship between state child welfare policies and other macro factors and reunification, while controlling for child factors. Participants and settingData came from the 2016–2019 Adoption and Foster Care Analysis Reporting System (AFCARS), which contains case-level information on all children in foster care during each fiscal year. MethodsWe conducted a series of multi-level survival analyses to observe the fixed effects of state-level factors and child-level factors on time to reunification among children who entered foster care in 2016. ResultsIn the unadjusted model, children in states with Title IV-E stipend programs for caseworkers had higher hazards of reunification (HR = 1.21, 95 % CI = 1.01–1.44) as did children in states with statewide in-home post-reunification services (HR = 1.63, 95 % CI = 1.16–2.28). Children in states that required a master's degree for caseworkers had lower hazards of reunification (HR = 0.72, 95 % CI = 0.59–0.95). ConclusionsFindings from this study highlight the importance of considering state policies and their impact on reunification. Implications for policy, practice, and research are explored.

Youth Dually-Involved in the child welfare and juvenile justice systems: Varying definitions and their associations with trauma exposure, posttraumatic stress, & offending

Recently, scholars have placed increasing effort on better understanding the unique needs of youth involved in both the child welfare and juvenile justice systems. This study drew from the Developmental Cascade of Multisystem Involvement Framework to examine group differences in trauma exposure, posttraumatic stress symptoms, and offending among youth solely involved in the juvenile justice system and youth with varying degrees of dual-system involvement, including crossover youth (i.e., youth with a history of maltreatment and offending regardless of system involvement), dual-contact youth (i.e., youth who had a history of a substantiated CW maltreatment petition prior to their involvement in the current study), and dually-involved youth (i.e., youth under the care and custody of the state's child welfare system at the time of study participation). Four-hundred adolescents (25% girls, Mage = 15.97) who were recruited from a detention center and completed self-report measures assessing trauma exposure, posttraumatic stress, and offending. Juvenile justice and child welfare records also were collected. Results indicated that, compared to youth solely involved in the juvenile justice system, crossover youth reported significantly more exposure to traumatic events, more severe posttraumatic stress symptoms, and more self-reported offending. In contrast, results indicated few differences between dual-contact youth and youth solely involved in the juvenile justice system; these groups only differed in age and in recidivism charges. There also were few differences between dually-involved youth and youth solely involved in the juvenile justice system; these groups only differed in age and exposure to non-Criterion A traumatic events. The current results suggest that categorizing youth as crossover youth based on their own self-reported history of child maltreatment exposure resulted in more observed differences between dual-system youth and youth solely involved in juvenile justice. The present results have valuable implications for how we operationalize youth’s system involvement and highlight the importance of examining child maltreatment as a point of prevention and intervention efforts for these youth.

Association of School Infrastructure on Health and Achievement Among Children With Asthma.

To determine whether school infrastructure is associated with health and academic outcomes among elementary school children with asthma. We conducted a retrospective cohort study of linked medical, academic, and facilities data from a large mid-Atlantic school district of the United States. All K-5 students with asthma who were enrolled under the state's Children's Health Insurance Program were included. We estimated associations of the infrastructure quality of the student's school, as assessed by an engineering firm in Summer 2011 and represented by the Facility Condition Index (FCI), with asthma health outcomes, absenteeism, and standardized test scores in math and reading in the 2 academic years thereafter. A total of 6558 students were identified, the majority non-Hispanic Black, across 130 schools. Most schools (97/130, 75%) were in very poor or worse condition. In cluster-adjusted models accounting for demographics, grade, school-specific area deprivation, and inhaled corticosteroid use, a one standard deviation increase in FCI, corresponding to greater infrastructure deficiency, was associated with higher rates of asthma-related hospitalizations (incidence rate ratio [IRR] 1.16; 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.03, 1.32), more absenteeism (IRR 1.05; 95% CI 1.01, 1.08), and lower scores in math (mean difference [MD] -3.3; 95% CI -5.5, -1.2) and reading (MD -3.0; 95% CI -5.1, -0.9). There were no differences in rates of asthma-related emergency visits or steroid prescriptions. Children with asthma attending schools with poorer infrastructure had worse health and academic outcomes. Public policy emphasizing reinvestment in school infrastructure may be a potential means of addressing asthma disparities.

"Give up your mic": Building capacity and sustainability within community-based participatory research initiatives.

Community-based participatory research (CBPR) partnerships strive to promote community capacity building and sustainability, yet initiatives often suffer when grants or relationships with academic partners end. To address these concerns, researchers hoping to develop truly sustainable CBPR partnerships should consider factors that promote the development of community capacity and, ultimately, independence. In this first-person account, using perspectives gathered from FAVOR, a Connecticut-based family-led advocacy organization and an academic researcher, we examine the practices and experiences of the members of a CBPR partnership focused on using community voice to inform changes in the state's children's behavioral health system of care. These practices ultimately led to FAVOR developing the necessary skills to assume full ownership of the community data-gathering initiative, ensuring that the initiative would be sustained. Through the perspectives of five FAVOR staff and an academic researcher, we describe the factors that contributed to the organization being able to develop the capacity to independently continue their community data-gathering initiative, including description of the training process and staff members' perspectives on training, autonomy, community value, and lessons learned. We use these stories and experiences to provide recommendations for other partnerships striving to promote capacity building and sustainability through community ownership of the research process.

Improving STEAM Knowledge and Skills for Pelopor Literasi Desaku

The term STEAM, which is an acronym for science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics, is an approach to learning to guide students in conducting research, discussion, collaboration and critical thinking. It is hoped that the end result is students who dare to take risks in their research, but still with careful consideration. Students can be directly involved in shaping the learning experience, and encouraged to be persistent in finding solutions to problems and active in collaborating and working through creative processes. Pelopor Literasi Desaku (PLD) are volunteers who provide assistance for school-age children at the State Children’s Learning House, Bengkung Village, Retno Temple, Secang Magelang. 10 STEAM activities were prepared for implementation by PLDs. This study used a qualitative descriptive design. There were 10 PLD participants, recruited through purposive sampling. The results of the study can be divided into four parts. General: (1) all participants stated that they had understood the concept of STEAM; (2) all participants were interested in STEAM activities; and (3) 90% of participants stated that they felt motivated by STEAM activities. Implementation of 10 STEAM activities: (1) 60% of the participants stated that the most interesting STEAM activity was the tie technique dye; (2) the most difficult activity was also the tie technique dye; (3) 90% of the participants stated that the tie technique dye activity was the most difficult; and (4) 40% of the participants stated that the CBS power rocket activity was related to learning at school. Relation to the disciplines of science: (1) 80% of participants thought that the simple thermometer activity was related to science; (2) 100% of participants stated that string art was related to mathematics; and (3) 50% of participants stated that string art was related to art. Others: 1) all participants stated that it was difficult to obtain tools and materials for string art; and 2) 60% of participants thought that string art requires high levels of creativity.
 Keywords: STEAM, community services

Child Sexual Abuse in India under POCSO Act, 2012: A Critical Analysis

When an adult or a more mature child or adolescent engages in sexual behaviour with a youngster, this is considered sexual abuse. On the other hand, the POCSO Act defines a "child" as anyone under the age of 18. Abuse of a kid can be defined as any action or inaction that causes injury to, or places a child at danger of harm from, another person. Abuse of children can take many forms, including sexual, emotional, and physical. Failure to meet a child's basic requirements constitutes neglect, another kind of maltreatment. Children who have been abused typically experience more severe emotional harm than physical harm. Depression is a common symptom of child maltreatment. It's possible he or she will retreat, entertain suicidal thoughts, or snap. A child who has reached adulthood may experiment with drugs or alcohol, attempt to run away, or abuse others. Abuse of children is a terrible issue. Call the authorities or your state's child welfare department if you have any reason to believe a child is being mistreated or neglected. The prevention of child sexual abuse is the focus of this paper, as are recent amendments to the POCSO Act and related provisions.

The parent trap: Extending New York State's parental liability law to hold parents liable for minor child's bullying

AbstractBullying is a phenomenon that results in psychological and physical effects, or even suicides and school shootings. Many states have enacted anti‐bullying laws to prevent bullying, but we still see the same tragedies that come from it. A town in New York jails parents for their child's bullying and has seen improvement. However, the goal of this amendment is to deter, not to punish. To protect the welfare and safety of our state's children, this Note proposes that New York amend its parental liability law by adopting the parental liability laws of Oregon, Tennessee, and the notification law of Utah.

Recommended Bibliographic Information on the Sites of Children Libraries and Criteria for Assessing its Quality

As part of the implementation of the “Strategy for the Development of the Information Society in the Russian Federation for 2017–2030”, an important task is to develop criteria for assessing the social effectiveness of electronic services in the field of culture– in particular, in librarianship. When organizing children’s reading, the leading role is played by information and recommendation support, which can increase the interest of children-readers in books and create conditions for a safe information media environment. The purpose of the study is to analyze the qualitative characteristics of the provision of recommendatory bibliographic information on the websites of children libraries. The evaluation of the quality of websites is based on universal criteria for optimal provision of elements necessary for informing readers. They are: the quality of content and its relevance, visual design of the site and providing feedback to users. The evaluation is supplemented by two unique criteria: “ensuring the information and psychological safety of children” and “communicative and speech qualities of the texts of book annotations”. The use of such a system in the analysis of online library services on the example of the Russian State Children’s Library and six regional and municipal children libraries has shown that, in general, information and advisory support in the field of children reading management successfully fulfills the task of forming a virtual library space. The main drawbacks of some websites identified are the risks associated with advertising banners and links to third-party resources containing information with the age limit “18+”

The effect of public health insurance expansions on the mental and behavioral health of girls and boys

This paper examines the effects of public health insurance expansions on the mental health care utilization and mental and behavioral health of children 6–17 years old. We leverage major expansions in public health insurance eligibility for children and adolescents under Medicaid and the State Children's Health Insurance Program during 1997–2002 to examine mental health care utilization and outcomes for children in the National Survey of America's Families. The study examines these dynamics by gender of children due to their distinct mental health care patterns and risks. The expansions are associated with an estimated 30% reduction in mental health care utilization for girls, but no measurable effect for boys, which may partly be accounted for by increased well-child visits for girls. Mental health improves only for teenagers; boys in particular have an estimated 22 percent increase in their probability of the highest level of health. Parents experience spillovers of lower insurance coverage for themselves – likely from dropping private family coverage for public child-only coverage – but slightly better mental health.

Surgical treatment of epilepsy at the Russian Children’s Clinical Hospital: substrates and imaging aspects

Introduction. MRI revealing the epileptogenic foci is the central part of the presurgical evaluation of children with focal-resistant epilepsy. Besides that, MRI seems to be a reliable instrument of treatment optimization and good prognosis. Aim. To identify epileptogenic lesions in children with resistant focal epilepsy by high resolution (HR) MRI and comparing obtained data with postsurgical morphology. Materials and methods. We assessed the results of neuroimaging, EEG, clinical neurological status, and postsurgical morphological data in 65 children with focal epilepsy who had undergone antiepileptic surgery in Russian State Children Hospital, neurosurgery department (Moscow, Russia) from 2016 to 2020. Results. The broad spectrum of epileptogenic lesions was revealed by HR MRI, including focal and diffuse cortical dysplasias (44.6%), cortical post hypoxic gliosis (27.7%), glial tumors (7.7%), Rasmussen encephalitis (10.8%), tuberous sclerosis, and Sturge-Weber syndrome (3%), small angiodysplasias (4.6%) and other. Focal cerebral dysplasia had an obvious superiority as the main etiological factor in focal epilepsy and was approved in 33.8% of all patients. In all cases, epilepsy is characterized by frequent and resistant seizures, inflicting motor arrest, and psycho-emotional deterioration. Conclusion. HR MRI and multidisciplinary investigation have to be unchangeable standards in the presurgical evaluation of children with focal epilepsy. This approach’s effectiveness has reassuring confirmation by high level (95.2%) of total coincidence MRI and morphological results.

Outcomes Associated With State Policies Enabling Provision of Oral Health Services in Medical Offices Among Medicaid-enrolled Children.

To increase receipt of preventive oral health services (POHS), all state Medicaid programs have enacted policies to encourage nondental providers to deliver POHS in medical offices. This study examined if these Medicaid policies improved oral health, as measured by reductions in dental visits with treatment and preventable emergency department (ED) visits for nontraumatic dental conditions (NTDC). Using data on children aged 6 months to up to 6 years from 38 state Medicaid programs during 2006-2014, we used a generalized difference-in-differences estimation approach to examine the probability of a child having, in a year, any dental visits with caries-related treatment and any ED visits for NTDC, conditional on length of policy enactment. Models included additional child-level and county-level characteristics, state and year fixed effects, probability weights, and clustered standard errors. Among a weighted sample of 45,107,240 child/year observations, 11.7% had any dental visits with treatment and 0.2% had any ED visits for NTDC annually. Children in states with and without medical POHS policies had similar odds of having any dental visits with treatment, regardless of length of policy enactment. Children in states with medical POHS policies enacted for one or more years had significantly greater odds of having any ED visits for NTDC (P<0.05). State policies making POHS available in medical offices did not affect rates of dental visits with caries-related treatment, but were associated with increased rates of potentially avoidable ED visits for NTDC. Findings suggest that many young Medicaid-enrollees lack access to dentists.

Supply of immigrant entrepreneurs and native entrepreneurship

Abstract Using nationally representative data from the United States, the author estimates the causal impact of immigrant entrepreneurship on entrepreneurial propensities of natives. The author draws data from the Annual Social and Economic Supplement of the Current Population Survey and uses within-state variation in supply of immigrant entrepreneurs for identification. To address concerns of endogeneity in the supply of immigrant entrepreneurs, the author takes advantage of a quasi-experiment provided by the State Children's Health Insurance Program. While the Ordinary Least Squares estimates indicate a positive effect, the Two Stage Least Squares estimates suggest that, on average, there is no significant effect of immigrant entrepreneurs on native entrepreneurship. Moreover, there is no net effect on subgroups of natives separated by skill level. There is also some evidence that immigrant entrepreneurs may “crowd-in” Blacks into certain types of self-employment. These results are in contrast to the significant negative impact suggested by the previous literature.

ДЕТСКОЕ ЧТЕНИЕ В РАКУРСЕ ГЕНДЕРНЫХ ИССЛЕДОВАНИЙ

The article shows approaches to the studying the children’s read- ing from the standpoint of gender socialization. There are major differences between the girls’ and boys’ reading due to several factors. The reading specifics of girls and boys in primary and secondary school age are given on the basis of data from sociological studies conducted in the last decade by sociologists of the Russian State Children’s Library.

What Explains the Gap in Welfare Use Among Immigrants and Natives?

We investigate the gap in welfare use between immigrants and natives over a 24-year period using the Annual Social and Economic Supplement of the Current Population Survey from 1995-2018, spanning periods of economic recessions and recoveries, changes in welfare policy regimes, and policies towards immigrants. A novel contribution of our research is to adopt the Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition analysis to study the effects of demographic factors, macroeconomic trends and policy on welfare use gap between immigrants and natives. Our analysis leads to three main findings: one, if immigrants had the same demographic characteristics as natives their participation in means-tested programs would have been much less overall and much below those of natives. This finding holds true across broader measures of welfare receipt capturing cash and near cash programs and health insurance as well as participation in five specific safety net programs. It also holds true across periods of economic recessions and recovery. Second, we find evidence that the business cycle impacts immigrant and native welfare participation differently. Immigrant participations in Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program and State Children’s Health Insurance Program are more sensitive to the business cycle than native participations. Three, we find that changes in program eligibility explain only a modest proportion of the immigrant-native gap in welfare use. A possible explanation for this finding is that changes in eligibility rules have affected only specific immigrant populations (e.g. new immigrants) whereas our analysis pertains to all immigrants.