Well-Child Care in Infancy

About the Book

Experimental findings have indicated an association between well-child care and cost-efficient health care and increased school readiness. But insurance companies and Medicaid administrators sometimes aren’t aware of the findings, which is why a book on well-child care is so necessary. William Pittard, a longtime medical doctor who has spent decades specializing in pediatrics, teams up with other experts to explore how well-child care promotes the health and future success of children in this book for parents, health care providers, policy makers, and others. Learn how: • Medicaid’s scope has been broadened to include preventative care; • confrontations and controversies have led to health care reform; • legislators and others can take action to improve coverage. The preventive care the authors focus on includes anticipatory guidance; continuity of care; assessment of growth and development; screening procedures for vision, hearing, dental, and cognitive development; and immunizations. By learning more about the health care system and what the latest research tells us about well-child care, you’ll be better equipped to promote the health and future success of children in a cost-effective way. That’s a win for parents, insurance companies, taxpayers, and most importantly—the next generation.

About the Author

Dr. Pittard received his MD degree from the University of Virginia and is board certified in pediatrics and the sub-board of neonatal-perinatal medicine. He also has a master of public health degree in maternal and child health from the University of Alabama at Birmingham and a PhD in health services and policy management from the University of South Carolina. He has served for more than thirty-five years in academic pediatrics at Case Western Reserve University (1976–1985) and the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) (1985–present). For more than fifteen years, he was the director of neonatology at MUSC. He has four children, and his experience and interest in the public health issues of children is reflected by his publications, most recently describing the association between well-child care utilization in the preschool years and both health status and readiness for school by South Carolina Medicaid-insured children. Dr. Roberts received his MD degree at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, completed his residency at the Medical College of Georgia, and did a general pediatric fellowship along with a master of public health in maternal and child health degree at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. He is a professor of pediatrics in the Division of General Pediatrics at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston. He is actively involved in patient care, teaching, and clinical investigation. Dr. Roberts is the director of the South Carolina Pediatric Practice Research Network and has coauthored more than forty peer-reviewed publications. On environmental health issues, he is nationally recognized as an expert. Dr. Roberts lives in Daniel Island, South Carolina, and enjoys spending time with his wife and two sons. He is an avid basketball player and ran his first half marathon at age forty-six. Dr. Gustafson received her MD degree at Southern Illinois University and her master of clinical research at the Medical University of South Carolina, where she is currently an assistant professor of pediatrics. She is the associate pediatric residency program director and the medical director of Pediatric Primary Care, the pediatric continuity clinic. Along with her patient care and teaching roles, her research has involved the use of structured clinical observations with the incorporation of the preventive screening recommendations outlined by Bright Futures/AAP, as well as quality-improvement projects incorporating the CHIPRA quality indicators as part of a patient-centered medical home statewide quality demonstration grant. She lives with her husband, son, and daughter on James Island, South Carolina, and enjoys spending time with her family on the waters surrounding Charleston. Oscar Lovelace is a board-certified family physician who has been practicing rural family medicine (including obstetrics) since he graduated from residency in 1988 at the University of Virginia, where he served as chief resident. He has served on the SC Board of Family Physicians. Currently he lectures to students at MUSC as a member of the clinical faculty and teaches third-year medical students as part of a required rural clinical rotation. He chaired the SC Governors Health Care Task Force in 2003. In 2011, he was named South Carolina’s Family Physician of the Year. In 2012, Dr. Lovelace was among six finalists for the America’s Family Physician of the Year award, and in 2015 he was selected as the AAFP National Family Practitioner of the Year. He is married and has four children. His avocation is casting a net for shrimp in the tidal creeks of coastal South Carolina. Dr. Paul M. Darden joined the department of pediatrics at the Oklahoma University Health Sciences Center in December 2008 as professor of pediatrics, chief of the section of general and community pediatrics, and the CMRI James Paul Linn Chair of Pediatrics. For more than twenty years, he was at the Medical University of South Carolina and held numerous positions. Most recently, he was the director of the South Carolina Pediatric Practice Research Network (SCPPRN), the director of the Academic Generalist Health Services Research Fellowship, and the vice chair for fellowship programs. His training was in pediatrics at Parkland Hospital and Children’s Medical Center in Dallas, followed by fellowship training in epidemiology at McGill and Montréal Children’s Hospital, Québec. He has a long-standing interest in the delivery of preventive care and in practice-based research. In Oklahoma, he has been working with Jim Mold and the Oklahoma Physicians Resource/Research Network (OKPRN). Most of his research has related to the delivery of preventive care to children; this has involved numerous studies of the delivery of vaccines and other preventive care in office practice. He has studied continuity of care, dental caries, developmental screening, and obesity among the many issues related to primary care. Currently he is working on a project examining how adolescents and their parents make decisions regarding vaccination and how best to help them with this process.