A Scoping Review of Literature on Preparation Programs for Children Undergoing Surgery and their Families

Thousands of children undergo surgery in Canada each year and many of them experience significant perioperative anxiety and pain. Parents also experience stress associated with their children's surgery, especially in managing children's pain and recovery at home. Much of this stress is associated with uncertainty around the procedure, lack of coping skills, and uncertainty in roles. Preoperative preparation has been presented as a treatment for children's distress as a result of surgery and hospitalization since the 1960s, but studies in this area are variable in the treatments they study, the outcomes they assess, and the research methodology they use. Currently, there is no thorough reivew of research on pediatric preoperative preparation and no evidence-based practice guidelines are available that are applicable across contexts. This is particularly concerning because most children's hospitals currently offer some degree of preparation without this evidence base. The current lack of synthesis risks not only wasting hospital resources by providing ineffective preparation, but also risks increasing distress in children and families by delivering preparation in the wrong way (e.g., too close to the procedurce, in an age-inappropriate way). Given the importance of this question and the lack of synthesis so far in the literature, the objective of the current project is to conduct a scoping review of literature to address the general research question "What is known from the current literature about the effectiveness of preparation programs for children undergoing surgery and their families?" This project represents a collaboration between established investigators in perioperative care and pediatric pain and knowledge users at both clinical and administrative levels. Ongoing integration of researchers and knowledge users throughout this project will ensure that results will have impacts on all children in Canada who undergo surgery