Child Life Related Experience

I'm currently working as a Certified Child Life Specialist at Nemours Children's Hospital in Wilmington, DE. I work on the 2 West PICU stepdown unit with a population of trauma, solid organ transplant, and medically complex children of all ages. I provide procedural preparation and support, encourage the use of coping strategies, provide family/sibling support, facilitate normalization and medical/therapeutic play, and legacy building activities for a 24-bed unit. I collaborate frequently with our interdisciplinary team, including nursing, PT/OT/speech therapy, social work, psychology, and more to ensure each of our patients are receiving quality care and coping with challenging medical experiences.

The majority of my practicum was spent in the NICU and the Pediatric Surgery and Hemodialysis outpatient clinics. The primary patient population during my practicum included pre-term infants in the NICU as well as dialysis patients of varying ages from infancy through late adolescence in the outpatient clinic. During my practicum, I improved my developmental assessment skills, organized and implemented bedside therapeutic and medical play activities in both of my rotation units, and improved rapport-building skills with patients and families. I also observed CCLS's in a variety of additional units providing distraction, support, and education for a variety of procedures, including iv placements, port access, sedation, and surgery. 

My volunteer experience at Cooper University Hospital was spent in the pediatric unit of the hospital. The primary patient population included children with varying diagnoses from infancy through adolescence. Responsibilities included providing caregivers with donated baskets, checking in to provide games and activities to patients and caregivers at the bedside, facilitating developmentally appropriate activities in the playroom, and ensuring sanitation of all materials available in the playroom. During this experience, I began learning about working with children in the hospital setting and the role of child life in providing psychosocial care to the family.

The Tides Program is a peer-support style bereavement program in Centre Country, PA. During my volunteer experience, the population I worked with included children ages 4-17 who had recently experienced the death of a close friend or family member. Main responsibilities include facilitating conversations to promote grief processing and coping and organizing developmentally appropriate activities and crafts that help encourage discussion and coping. Through this experience, I improved my leadership and teamwork skills by working closely with other volunteers to ensure all activities were facilitated in a way that correlated with the developmental level of the groups of children.

During my internship, I completed rotations on the Heart and Kidney inpatient unit, Hemodialysis unit, and Surgical Services unit. During this time, I was responsible for first observing and later applying my knowledge from coursework and observation to begin providing child life services to patients and families in these areas. I completed several case studies and planned activities, as well as completing and implementing a large, overarching quality-improvement project on improving medication compliance and pill swallowing in children. This project is available for view on my "Projects" page! Following completion of my internship, I passed the Child Life Certification exam.

The majority of my volunteer experience at Penn State Children's Hospital was spent in the Pediatric Intermediate Care unit and Inpatient Hematology/Oncology unit. The primary patient population included infants/toddlers with tracheotomies in the PIMCU and hematology/oncology patients of varying ages from infancy through adolescence. Duties included checking in with caregivers to provide breaks, facilitating developmentally appropriate play and stimulation at the bedside, and ensuring sanitation of all toys in the playrooms. During this experience, I began making connections between coursework and patients regarding developmental theory and provided activities based on developmental stage and age of each patient. 

Hole in the Wall Gang Camp is a medical camp for children. The population of children I worked with included a cabin of seven 8–10-year-old girls with sickle cell disease. Responsibilities included caring for children with blood disorders for a full week, while facilitating fun and therapeutic camp-like activities. I was also responsible for ensuring all children in my cabin were provided with nutritious meals and snacks, adequate hydration, and accompaniment to receive medical care when needed. Through this experience, I learned about the various aspects of sickle cell disease and other blood disorders and the accommodations that can be made to provide children with these disorders opportunities to just be kids.

Through Big Brothers Big Sisters, I am paired directly with an 11-year-old girl who the county and her caregivers have identified as "at-risk" due to the recent death of her mother and being raised by a single father. My responsibilities include facilitating one-on-one developmentally appropriate activities with her, including bike rides, scavenger hunts, crafts, movie nights, and baking. My primary responsibility through this position is to serve as a strong female role model and provide my Little Sister with opportunities for growth as well as a trusting relationship. In addition, I am responsible for communicating with her father as well as her case manager as well as accompanying her to group activities with other members of the BBBS program.