Child Life Program
The support your child deserves
Working at your child’s bedside or by their side in the playroom, the Child Life Specialist at Fountain Valley Regional Hospital is there to create positive experiences during their hospital stay and provide emotional support.
It’s all a part of the Child Life Program the hospital created to help the entire family.
Child Life Specialist
Each child is assigned a Child Life Specialist, who has a background in child development. The specialist provides emotional support for families and encourages optimum development of children facing a broad range of challenging experiences, especially those related to their healthcare issues and hospital stay.
What a Child Life Specialist Provides
Physical and mental activities are a big part of the healing process. The Child Life Specialist can help your child learn effective coping through play, preparation, education and self-expression activities.
In addition to creative and therapeutic activities for inpatient children, the Child Life Specialist actively helps children and their families prepare for surgery and procedures. Specialists are available to meet with families of both medical and surgical patients, conduct hospital tours, and explain the upcoming procedures using dolls and terms children can understand.
What Can Child Life Offer Your Family?
- Pre-operative teaching and tours
- Family and sibling teaching and support
- Diversional support during procedures
- Teaching about new diagnoses
- Age-appropriate toys and activities in the playrooms
- Bedside and playroom activities with volunteers
- Medical play
- School liaison support
- Pet therapy
For more information about the Child Life Program, call 888-691-3055.
