Parent Perspectives on Co-located Parent Coaching Services within Pediatric Primary Care

The pediatric primary care setting offers a promising platform for delivering positive parenting interventions as a strategy to prevent childhood adversity and behavioral health issues. This pilot project assessed parents’ acceptability and perspectives of Parent Connext^TM, a positive parenting and prevention program that includes screening for parenting and family psychosocial concerns by pediatricians and individualized parent coaching for parents by co-located Parenting Specialists. Eleven pediatric practices implemented Parent Connext^TM over a three year period, and 1,301 families participated in parent coaching. Parents were invited to complete surveys on parenting and psychosocial factors at sessions 1, 3, and 3 months follow-up and were emailed a satisfaction survey after their last session and invited to participate in a phone interview. A subsample of 280 biological mothers who completed surveys at multiple time points showed improved parenting satisfaction, parenting efficacy, and parent-child interaction and reduced psychosocial concerns over time. The majority (≥97%) of the 387 parents who completed the satisfaction survey reported satisfaction with the accessibility, convenience, and quality of the parent coaching service. Nearly all 27 parents interviewed (96%) reported being highly likely to recommend the service to a friend or parent, and most (84%) felt their needs had been met. Parents described the key program attributes to include normalization of their experiences, non-judgmental support, easy-to-implement tailored strategies, and empowerment in parenting. Overall, parents found Parent Connext^TM to be a worthwhile addition to their pediatric primary care. Alternative payment models are needed to support the sustainability of integrated programs like Parent Connext^TM.