Ad HoC conferences of hospital and community professionals in cases of hospitalized physically abused children.
OBJECTIVE
Although community interagency child protection teams are common and well described in the literature, they may not meet the needs of investigating agencies when children are hospitalized in tertiary medical facilities some distance from their homes. Sometimes, the communities in which they live do not have effective teams, or the information to be conveyed is highly technical. This report describes and assesses ad hoc multi-agency conferences with varying hospital and community agency participants, each conference devoted to a single hospitalized child suspected of having been abused.


METHODS
A questionnaire devised by the authors was administered by telephone to 22 former conference participants from state social agencies, law enforcement units, and prosecuting attorney's offices.


RESULTS
Most of the surveyed participants reported the case-specific conferences to have been helpful, meeting their goals and affecting the outcomes of their cases.


CONCLUSIONS
The conferences appear to have been worthwhile. Although they were associated with some disadvantages for the involved professionals and the sponsoring hospital, the disadvantages appeared to have been offset by the potential benefits for the children, families, participants, and hospital.
Jones
J G
JG
Department of Pediatrics, University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, Little Rock, USA.
Worthington
T
T
Hawks
F
F
Mercer
S O
SO
Jones
B W
BW
Woon
L
L
D002648:Child; D002649:Child Abuse / Q000517:prevention & control* / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003153:Community Health Services; D003226:Congresses as Topic; D003625:Data Collection; D006760:Hospitalization; D006801:Humans; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires