A Day in the Life of a Child Life Specialist

Day In the Life of a Child Life Specialist at Franciscan Children’s

At Franciscan Children’s, our Child Life Specialists foster our patients’ emotional, social and cognitive growth during their stay through developmental play interventions and procedural support. Most of their time is spent with children and adolescents in our Inpatient Medical and Mental Health Units, Pediatric Rehabilitation program and Outpatient Surgical Services program. In celebration of Child Life Month and the wonderful work that they do, we asked them to walk us through a typical day in Child Life.

8:00 a.m. – Child Life Specialists (CLS) and Child Life Assistants arrive, read notes from the previous night/day and do general housekeeping within the playroom to make sure it is clean and ready for the day!

8:30 a.m. – Rounding begins. During this time, we get caught up on the current status of all of our patients. As a Child Life team, we are lucky to be a part of an organization that works so collaboratively among all therapies and disciplines.

9:00 a.m.– Members of Child Life attend a morning meeting, either with members from Behavioral Health or solely with the Child Life team. During this time, we discuss our goals for the day, what each patient needs and how we are going to split up our activities.

The Child Life team dressed up as M&M’s for Halloween last year!

10:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. – This is when the fun begins! Throughout the morning, the CLS team visits with our patients to provide therapeutic play at their bedside or in the playroom, helping normalize the hospital setting. We also provide procedural support and prep and overall socialization to patients. You can find a CLS helping a child through an IV placement or a blood draw, or just having fun with patients by doing activities such as bringing snow in from outside to build a snowman!

Left: Elijah playing with snow, facilitated by Child Life Assistant Eliza Alden

Right: Alejandro having some laughs while watching funny videos, singing and dancing with a Child Life Assistant Cassidy Woods

Our Child Life Specialists also help our Occupational Therapy (OT), Physical Therapy and Speech Therapy teams by doing a “co-treat”. A co-treat is when members of Child Life are present during a patient’s therapy session to help facilitate and engage with them in developmentally appropriate ways.

Every two weeks, Child Life Specialists rotate to our Dental Surgery Unit. While in the OR, specialists help prep patients for their procedure, making sure they are as comfortable as possible and providing effective distraction methods to make their surgical experience as smooth as possible. To prep our patients for anesthesia, our CLS has patients decorate their own anesthesia mask and explains the “sleepy medicine” they will receive in a developmentally appropriate way.

Child Life Specialist, Christina shows off a decorated anesthesia mask that she uses with patients who come into our OR for Dental services.

1 – 4 p.m.:

The afternoon is a time for relaxation and naps for many of our patients. The Child Life team takes advantage of this time to provide family and caregiver support for those who cannot physically be here all the time and to we do crafts with our patients to show their caregivers when they visit next! Below is an example of a book we created with one of our patients, Max. Each week we add a new craft that Max has made to share when his caregivers come and visit. He loves getting his feet painted!

As a Child Life team, we feel lucky to be able to celebrate big moments with all our patients. From birthdays, holidays, patient discharges and everything in between – it is a great privilege to celebrate the progress each patient makes and their life milestones!

When we are able, we love bringing patients to the playroom for some playtime! We have been lucky to work with our music therapists to host music groups. Patients enjoy playing instruments and socializing with one another. Patients also enjoy playing on swings, making artwork, playing with toys, or just having some snuggle time.

Left: Bradi having fun standing and using her shaker during music group

Right: Elijah making some beautiful artwork than can be found up on the wall of the playroom!

When needed, a member of Child Life will also visit our Inpatient Mental Health Unit and do activities such as pumpkin carving, cookie decorating and crafts around holiday celebrations. In collaboration with our expressive therapist, Lauren Sideravage, we can provide these patients with some time to engage in creative expression and socialization with one another and the Child Life team. The patients on our Mental Health Unit are so creative and we love getting to spend time with them.

4:00-4:30 p.m. – Time to wrap up our day! Child Life Specialists use this time to document interactions and supports used with our patients and to sanitize and organize the playroom, so it is ready to use at the start of the next day.

Isaiah hugging CLS Emily goodbye on his discharge day!

Child Life Specialists are an important part of the care team at Franciscan Children’s. It is through their work that the patients can express themselves through art, music, play and more. We are so thankful for the work of our Child Life team and appreciate all that they do to help the children at Franciscan Children’s.