Any parent who has brought their child to a vaccine appointment knows the stress it can cause everyone in the room, from the kid who\u2019s terrified of needles to the busy nurse trying to work on a wiggling body.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Certified child life specialists like Caitlin McGonagle \u201913, who works at Children\u2019s Hospital Colorado, can help ease the situation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cOur job is to minimize immediate and long-term effects of stress, anxiety, and psychosocial trauma for children and their families,\u201d says McGonagle, who has been at the Aurora hospital for almost seven years. \u201cI provide preparation for procedures, as well as education related to the medical environment and different experiences children and their families will have.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There\u2019s a fun side of McGonagle\u2019s job too. In her \u201cdistraction bag,\u201d McGonagle\u2019s tools include stress balls, fidget toys, dinosaurs, and light spinners. \u201cI\u2019ll introduce some sort of play and then talk about the reason we\u2019re there and the hard thing we have to do,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
McGonagle will pull out a teddy bear to show how a tourniquet works or provide a pinwheel so the patient can practice deep breaths. \u201cWe talk about a coping plan, and during the procedure, we implement that coping plan,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When the child follows the plan, it makes it easier for the staff. \u201cThe medical staff\u2019s job is to complete the procedure,\u201d McGonagle says. \u201cBehavior management and preparation can take away from the focus on their work, so we\u2019re there to provide support to the medical staff to enable them to do their job successfully and efficiently.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sometimes, a child\u2019s anxiety and hesitation build up before they even enter the facility. In those cases, McGonagle makes a preparation booklet that includes pictures of the rooms and the steps of the visit. It also suggests bringing comfort items, like a favorite stuffed animal or blanket.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The child life specialist career became known to McGonagle when she was a Colgate student working at a Colorado summer camp for burn survivors. She was a horseback-riding counselor, but learned about the various medical staff roles at the camp. \u201cI\u2019d always been interested in working with kids,\u201d says McGonagle, who minored in educational studies and was considering working in a school setting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After being introduced to the child life specialist profession, McGonagle began a second bachelor\u2019s degree, in human development and family studies with a focus on child life, at Colorado State University. A 600-hour clinical internship and certification exam were her final hurdles before starting her career.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At Children\u2019s Hospital Colorado, McGonagle works in its outpatient clinics, from primary care to audiology to orthopedics. No matter the setting, her job requires her to develop rapport with
the patient and family quickly. \u201cIt can be challenging to, in such a short amount of time, make sure we are providing a safe space for patients and families to get through these hard things,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But when it goes smoothly, it can help that patient not only through the current procedure but also in how they think about future visits. \u201cNeedle fear is a huge problem,\u201d McGonagle says. \u201cI don\u2019t want fear of getting a poke at the doctor\u2019s office to be a barrier to accessing health care for kids and their families.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Explaining things on their level and helping children have some control of their experience are small measures that can have a lasting effect.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Certified child life specialists like Caitlin McGonagle \u201913 help ease kids’ stress in medical settings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":49,"featured_media":14729,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_hide_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_featured_image_duplicate_dismissed":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,2],"tags":[2230,888,413,68,1237,858],"coauthors":[388],"class_list":["post-14550","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-alumni-spotlights","category-alumni-updates","tag-child-life-specialist","tag-children","tag-educational-studies","tag-health","tag-medical","tag-vaccine"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/palXSH-3MG","amp_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2024\/04\/Colgate-caitlin-final-400pxl.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14550","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/49"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14550"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14550\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15041,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14550\/revisions\/15041"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14729"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14550"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14550"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14550"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.colgate.edu\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=14550"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}