Children and families develop in a complex world that includes neighborhoods, schools, health care practices, and places of worship, among other institutions. Much of how we understand, and support, children and families treats these elements of children’s lives as discrete non-integrated elements of their developmental context. In a just-released Supplement Issue of the journal Pediatrics, a national group of scientists and practitioners, including FPG’s Associate Director for Research, Ronald Seifer, PhD, propose to examine these factors as integral to pediatric care supporting the development of behavioral health, especially among the most marginalized families and beginning in the first years of life.

The authors note that our current highly stressed health care system would benefit from a fundamental reorganization of pediatric primary care to include integrated behavioral health support that is evidence-based, proactive, trauma-informed, and multidisciplinary. These changes would require appropriate financing models, substantial workforce development, continued research to expand the evidence for effective practice, and appropriate implementation expertise to bring these changes to scale.

This life course health development perspective, focused on early relational health, provides a framework in which to re-imagine the scope of early childhood developmental supports within the health care system.