Children with Medical Complexity in the Canadian Maritimes: A Mixed Methods Study

Children with medical complexity refer to those who experience a variety of complex chronic health conditions which impact their daily life. While we expect this population of children to be small in numbers, they require a large amount of health care resources to manage their medical conditions. Many of these children are discharged from hospital to be cared for in their home communities by their families and a range of interdisciplinary care providers. This transfer of responsibility highlights the need to adequately support the complex medical, social, and financial needs of these families. Unfortunately, there is a disconnect between our current health care system and the needs of these children and their families. Thus, this proposed research will focus on examining and describing the population of children with medical complexity who live in the Canadian Maritimes to develop practice and policy recommendations. A multi-phase mixed methods research approach to will be used to examine this issue. I will begin by using existing health data to identify these children and their characteristics over a 10-year period (2005-2015). Findings from this first phase will guide the development of in-depth case studies in phase 2 to deepen our understanding of the experiences of this vulnerable population in their home communities. Developing a greater understanding of the population of children with medical complexity in Canada is urgently needed as the first step in designing patient-oriented health policies and programs to improve the health care experiences, health system use, and health outcomes of children with medical complexity and their families.