Families have an unmatched impact on their child’s health, especially during the early years of life when children’s rapidly developing brains are laying the groundwork for their future health and wellbeing. To be the best advocates for their children, families need the right supports, whether they be access to public assistance programs like Medicaid and housing, opportunities to build a strong relationship with their child’s health provider, or resources that empower them to support their child’s social and emotional health. Right now, the NICHQ-led Early Childhood Comprehensive Systems CoIIN (ECCS CoIIN) and other initiatives across the country are seeking to answer a critical question:
- How do we improve these supports and their underlying systems to build families’ capacity to promote their child’s healthy development?
Pediatricians, early learning experts, state officials, and public health professionals all have important ideas and invaluable experience. But unless families are in the room for the conversations that affect them, the answers to this critical question being posed by ECCS CoIIN and others will remain limited. Only families themselves truly understand their own unique circumstances and needs, and only families can tell their own stories. This is one reason why engaging family partners is critical for any improvement effort.
True family partnership means families are at the table from the start. Organizations and improvement teams that embody that principle enlist families as experts and ask them to share their unique experiences and perspectives about their families and their communities, and about problems and solutions.
[For more on this resource, go to https://www.nichq.org/insight/...ing-family-partners?]
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