Adolescent Care Service
Health care services for adolescents generally take place in a variety of settings. They can range from a family physician or general internist's office to a community health center or school-based clinic to hospital-based adolescent care centers. A small number of adolescents (about 1 percent) use nontraditional settings, such as a family planning center or emergency department, as their usual source of care. A much smaller proportion of adolescents with special health needs--such as those who have a history of chronic illness or a mental illness--receive their primary medical care at these types of sites (Maternal and Child Health Bureau, 2008).
Adolescents receive their primary care from their usual source of health care, usually in a private provider office. For those with insurance through their parents' employers, this typically means a pediatrician, family physician, general internist, or nurse practitioner. For those with public insurance, the source of care may include a community health center, an emergency department, or a hospital-based adolescent health clinic.
These Adolescent Care Services visits are often accompanied by discussions with their providers about their health status and a range of potential problems, including drug and alcohol use, sexual behavior, sexually transmitted infections (STIs), or mental health issues. Some research has indicated that adolescent health professionals are not adequately trained to address these sensitive topics, and it is important to identify and implement strategies to improve providers' counseling skills.
Some of these barriers to health care utilization can be addressed through adolescent health promotion and disease prevention services. For example, an adolescent-focused program that provided education and counseling about tobacco, alcohol, and substance use; sexual behavior; and safety significantly improved the rates of screening and referrals for these risks among providers (Grunbaum et al., 2004).
Other challenges to adolescent health services relate to the nature and skills of the workforce that provides care. For instance, the National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey found that a majority of adolescent health care visits for ages 11 to 14 were made to pediatricians; however, adolescents in older adolescence (ages 15 to 19) spent more time with family physicians and general internists or gynecologists.
This variation in service settings creates a significant challenge for the design and delivery of effective adolescent health care services. This challenge is particularly true of those services that target specific subpopulations, such as those who are in the foster care system or in families with recent immigration or LGBT identities.
Providing these services in the appropriate settings and facilitating open communication about sensitive behaviors and health conditions requires knowledge of both the adolescent population and the relevant public and private law that protects confidentiality. Confidentiality is a major factor in whether adolescents will seek health services and disclose information to their health care providers, and it is also an important component of the trust that young people need to feel when engaging with health professionals. Read more about the Meridian HealthCare today.
A body of overlapping and sometimes conflicting statutes, court decisions, and regulations exists that are relevant to adolescent health services. These statutes, decisions, and regulations address issues such as evidentiary privileges, funding statutes, medical privacy and records laws, minor consent laws, and the constitutional right of privacy. Moreover, the legal protections are subject to ongoing change. This post: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolescence elaborate more on the topic, so you may need to check it out.